Justification by Faith Alone
by

Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758)

"But to him that worketh not, but
believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for
righteousness." -- Romans 4:5

Subject: We are justified only by faith in
Christ, and not by any manner of goodness of our own.

The following
things may be noted in this verse:

1. That justification
respects a man as ungodly. This is evident by these words — that justifieth
the ungodly, which cannot imply less than that God, in the act of
justification, has no regard to anything in the person justified, as godliness
or any goodness in him, but that immediately before this act, God beholds him
only as an ungodly creature, so that godliness in the person to be justified is
not so antecedent to his justification as to be the ground of it. When it is
said that God justifies the ungodly, it is as absurd to suppose that our
godliness, taken as some goodness in us, is the ground of our justification, as
when it is said that Christ gave sight to the blind to suppose that sight was
prior to, and the ground of, that act of mercy in Christ. Or as, if it should be
said that such an one by his bounty has made a poor man rich, to suppose that it
was the wealth of this poor man that was the ground of this bounty towards him,
and was the price by which it was procured.

2. It appears, that by
him that worketh not, in this verse, is not meant one who merely does not
conform to the ceremonial law, because he that worketh not, and the
ungodly, are evidently synonymous expressions, or what signify the same, as
appears by the manner of their connection. If not, to what purpose is the latter
expression, the ungodly, brought in? The context gives no other occasion
for it, but to show that by the grace of the gospel, God in justification has no
regard to any godliness of ours. The foregoing verse is, “Now to him that
worketh, is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt.” In that
verse, it is evident that gospel grace consists in the reward being given without
works, and in this verse, which immediately follows it, and in sense
is connected with it, gospel grace consists in a man’s being justified as ungodly.
By which it is most plain, that by him that worketh not, and him that is ungodly,
are meant the same thing, and that therefore not only works of the ceremonial
law are excluded in this business of justification, but works of morality and
godliness.

It is evident in the words,
that by the faith here spoken of, by which we are justified, is not meant the
same thing as a course of obedience or righteousness, since the expression by
which this faith is here denoted, is believing on him that justifies the
ungodly. — They that oppose the Solifidians, as they call them, greatly
insist on it, that we should take the words of Scripture concerning this
doctrine in their most natural and obvious meaning, and how do they cry out, of
our clouding this doctrine with obscure metaphors, and unintelligible figures of
speech? But is this to interpret Scripture according to its most obvious
meaning, when the Scripture speaks of our believing on him that justifies the
ungodly, or the breakers of his law, to say that the meaning of it is
performing a course of obedience to his law, and avoiding the breaches of it?
Believing on God as a justifier, certainly is a different thing from
submitting to God as a lawgiver, especially believing on him as a
justifier of the ungodly, or rebels against the lawgiver.

4. It is evident that the
subject of justification is looked upon as destitute of any righteousness in
himself, by that expression, it is counted, or imputed to him for
righteousness. — The phrase, as the apostle uses it here and in the
context, manifestly imports that God of his sovereign grace is pleased in his
dealings with the sinner, so to regard one that has no righteousness, that the
consequence shall be the same as if he had. This however may be from the respect
it bears to something that is indeed righteous. It is plain that this is the
force of the expression in the preceding verses. In the last verse but one, it
is manifest, the apostle lays the stress of his argument for the free grace of
God — from that text of the Old Testament about Abraham — on the word counted
or imputed. This is the thing that he supposed God to show his grace in, viz.
in his counting something for righteousness, in his consequential
dealings with Abraham, that was no righteousness in itself. And in the next
verse, which immediately precedes the text, “Now to him that worketh is the
reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt,” the word there translated reckoned,
is the same that in the other verses is rendered imputed and counted,
and it is as much as if the apostle had said, “As to him that works, there
is no need of any gracious reckoning or counting it for
righteousness, and causing the reward to follow as if it were a righteousness.
For if he has works, he has that which is a righteousness in itself, to which
the reward properly belongs.” This is further evident by the words that
follow, Rom. 4:6, “Even as David also described the blessedness of the man,
unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works.” What can here be meant by
imputing righteousness without works, but imputing righteousness to him that has
none of his own? Verse 7, 8, “Saying, Blessed are they whose iniquities are
forgiven, and whose sins are covered: blessed is the man to whom the Lord will
not impute sin.” How are these words of David to the apostle’s purpose? Or
how do they prove any such thing, as that righteousness is imputed without
works, unless it be because the word imputed is used, and the subject of
the imputation is mentioned as a sinner, and consequently destitute of a moral
righteousness? For David says no such thing, as that he is forgiven without the
works of the ceremonial law. There is no hint of the ceremonial law, or
reference to it, in the words. I will therefore venture to infer this doctrine
from the words, for the subject of my present discourse, viz.

That we are justified
only by faith in Christ, and not by any manner of virtue or goodness of our own.

Such an assertion as this, I
am sensible, many would be ready to call absurd, as betraying a great deal of
ignorance, and containing much inconsistency, but I desire everyone’s patience
till I have done.

In handling this doctrine, I
would:

I. Explain the meaning
of it, and show how I would be understood by such an assertion.

II. Proceed to the
consideration of the evidence of the truth of it.

III. Show how evangelical
obedience is concerned in this affair.

IV. Answer objections.

V. Consider the importance
of the doctrine.

I. I would explain
the meaning of the doctrine, or show in what sense I assert it, and would
endeavor to evince the truth of it, which may be done in answer to these two
inquiries, viz. 1.What is meant by being justified? 2. What is meant when
it is said, that this is “by faith alone, without any manner of virtue or
goodness of our own?”

First,
I would show what justification is, or what I suppose is meant in Scripture by
being justified.

A person is to be justified,
when he is approved of God as free from the guilt of sin and its deserved
punishment, and as having that righteousness belonging to him that entitles to
the reward of life. That we should take the word in such a sense, and understand
it as the judge’s accepting a person as having both a negative and positive
righteousness belonging to him, and looking on him therefore as not only free
from any obligation to punishment, but also as just and righteous and so
entitled to a positive reward, is not only most agreeable to the etymology and
natural import of the word, which signifies to pass one for righteous in
judgment, but also manifestly agreeable to the force of the word as used in
Scripture.

Some suppose that
nothing more is intended in Scripture by justification, than barely the
remission of sins. If so, it is very strange, if we consider the nature of the
case. For it is most evident, and none will deny, that it is with respect to the
rule or law of God we are under, that we are said in Scripture to be either
justified or condemned. Now what is it to justify a person as the subject of a
law or rule, but to judge him as standing right with respect to that rule? To
justify a person in a particular case, is to approve of him as standing right,
as subject to the law in that case, and to justify in general is to pass him in
judgment, as standing right in a state correspondent to the law or rule in
general. But certainly, in order to a person’s being looked on as standing
right with respect to the rule in general, or in a state corresponding with the
law of God, more is needful than not having the guilt of sin. For whatever that
law is, whether a new or an old one, doubtless something positive is needed in
order to its being answered. We are no more justified by the voice of the law,
or of him that judges according to it, by a mere pardon of sin, than Adam, our
first surety, was justified by the law, at the first point of his existence,
before he had fulfilled the obedience of the law, or had so much as any trial
whether he would fulfill it or no. If Adam had finished his course of perfect
obedience, he would have been justified, and certainly his justification would
have implied something more than what is merely negative. He would have been
approved of, as having fulfilled the righteousness of the law, and accordingly
would have been adjudged to the reward of it. So Christ, our second surety (in
whose justification all whose surety he is, are virtually justified), was not
justified till he had done the work the Father had appointed him, and kept the
Father’s commandments through all trials, and then in his resurrection he was
justified. When he had been put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the
Spirit, 1 Pet. 3:18, then he that was manifest in the flesh was justified in the
Spirit, 1 Tim. 3:16. But God, when he justified him in raising him from the
dead, did not only release him from his humiliation for sin, and acquit him from
any further suffering or abasement for it, but admitted him to that eternal and
immortal life, and to the beginning of that exaltation that was the reward of
what he had done. And indeed the justification of a believer is no other than
his being admitted to communion in the justification of this head and surety of
all believers: for as Christ suffered the punishment of sin, not as a private
person, but as our surety. So when after this suffering he was raised from the
dead, he was therein justified, not as a private person, but as the surety and
representative of all that should believe in him. So that he was raised again
not only for his own, but also for our justification, according to the apostle,
Rom. 4:25, “Who was delivered for our offenses, and raised again for our
justification.” And therefore it is that the apostle says, as he does in Rom.
8:34, “Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is
risen again.”

But that a
believer’s justification implies not only remission of sins, or acquittal from
the wrath due to it, but also an admittance to a title to that glory which is
the reward of righteousness, is more directly taught in the Scriptures,
particularly in Rom. 5:1, 2, where the apostle mentions both these as joint
benefits implied in justification: “Therefore being justified by faith, we
have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom also we have access
into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God.” So
remission of sin, and inheritance among them that are sanctified, are mentioned
together as what are jointly obtained by faith in Christ, Acts 26:18, “That
they may receive forgiveness of sins, and inheritance among them that are
sanctified through faith that is in me.” Both these are without doubt implied
in that passing from death to life, which Christ speaks of as the fruit of
faith, and which he opposes to condemnation, John 5:24, “Verily I say unto
you, he that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath
everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death
unto life.”

I proceed now,

Secondly, to
show what is meant when it is said, that this justification is by faith only,
and not by any virtue or goodness of our own.

This inquiry may be
subdivided into two, viz.

1. How it is by faith.
2. How it is by faith alone, without any manner of goodness of ours.

1. How
justification is by faith. — Here the great difficulty has been about
the import and force of the particle by, or what is that influence that
faith has in the affair of justification that is expressed in Scripture by being
justified by faith.

Here, if I may
humbly express what seems evident to me, though faith be indeed the condition of
justification so as nothing else is, yet this matter is not clearly and
sufficiently explained by saying that faith is the condition of justification,
and that because the word seems ambiguous, both in common use, and also as used
in divinity. In one sense, Christ alone performs the condition of our
justification and salvation. In another sense, faith is the condition of
justification, and in another sense, other qualifications and acts are
conditions of salvation and justification too. There seems to be a great deal of
ambiguity in such expressions as are commonly used (which yet we are forced to
use), such as condition of salvation, what is required in order to salvation or
justification, the terms of the covenant, and the like, and I believe they are
understood in very different senses by different persons. And besides, as the
word condition is very often understood in the common use of language, faith is
not the only thing in us that is the condition of justification. For by the word
condition, as it is very often (and perhaps most commonly) used, we mean
anything that may have the place of a condition in a conditional proposition,
and as such is truly connected with the consequent, especially if the
proposition holds both in the affirmative and negative, as the condition is
either affirmed or denied. If it be that with which, or which being supposed, a
thing shall be, and without which, or it being denied, a thing shall not be, we
in such a case call it a condition of that thing. But in this sense faith is not
the only condition of salvation and justification. For there are many things
that accompany and flow from faith, with which justification shall be, and
without which, it will not be, and therefore are found to be put in Scripture in
conditional propositions with justification and salvation, in multitudes of
places. Such are love to God, and love to our brethren, forgiving men their
trespasses, and many other good qualifications and acts. And there are many
other things besides faith, which are directly proposed to us, to be pursued or
performed by us, in order to eternal life, which if they are done, or obtained,
we shall have eternal life, and if not done, or not obtained, we shall surely
perish. And if faith was the only condition of justification in this sense, I do
not apprehend that to say faith was the condition of justification, would
express the sense of that phrase of Scripture, of being justified by faith.
There is a difference between being justified by a thing, and that thing
universally, necessarily, and inseparably attending justification: for so do a
great many things that we are not said to be justified by. It is not the
inseparable connection with justification that the Holy Ghost would signify (or
that is naturally signified) by such a phrase, but some particular influence
that faith has in the affair, or some certain dependence that effect has on its
influence.

Some, aware of
this, have supposed that the influence or dependence might well be expressed by
faith’s being the instrument of our justification, which has been
misunderstood, and injuriously represented, and ridiculed by those that have
denied the doctrine of justification by faith alone, as though they had supposed
faith was used as an instrument in the hand of God, whereby he performed and
brought to pass that act of his, viz. approving and justifying the
believer. Whereas it was not intended that faith was the instrument wherewith
God justifies, but the instrument wherewith we receive justification: not the
instrument wherewith the justifier acts in justifying, but wherewith the
receiver of justification acts in accepting justification. But yet, it must be
owned, this is an obscure way of speaking, and there must certainly be some
impropriety in calling it an instrument wherewith we receive or accept
justification. For the very persons who thus explain the matter, speak of faith
as being the reception or acceptance itself, and if so, how can it be the
instrument of reception or acceptance? Certainly there is a difference between
the act and the instrument. Besides, by their own descriptions of faith, Christ,
the mediator, by whom and his righteousness by which we are justified, is more
directly the object of this acceptance and justification, which is the benefit
arising therefrom more indirectly. Therefore, if faith be an instrument, it is
more properly the instrument by which we receive Christ, than the instrument by
which we receive justification.

But I humbly
conceive we have been ready to look too far to find out what that influence of
faith in our justification is, or what is that dependence of this effect on
faith, signified by the expression of being justified by faith, overlooking that
which is most obviously pointed forth in the expression, viz. that (there
being a mediator that has purchased justification) faith in this mediator is
that which renders it a meet and suitable thing, in the sight of God, that the
believer, rather than others, should have this purchased benefit assigned to
him. There is this benefit purchased, which God sees it to be a more meet and
suitable thing that it should be assigned to some rather than others, because he
sees them differently qualified: that qualification wherein the meetness to this
benefit, as the case stands, consists, is that in us by which we are justified.
If Christ had not come into the world and died, etc. to purchase justification,
no qualification whatever in us could render it a meet or fit thing that we
should be justified. But the case being as it now stands, viz. that
Christ has actually purchased justification by his own blood for infinitely
unworthy creatures, there may be certain qualifications found in some persons,
which, either from the relation it bears to the mediator and his merits, or on
some other account, is the thing that in the sight of God renders it a meet and
condecent thing, that they should have an interest in this purchased benefit,
and of which if any are destitute, it renders it an unfit and unsuitable thing
that they should have it. The wisdom of God in his constitutions doubtless
appears much in the fitness and beauty of them, so that those things are
established to be done that are fit to be done, and that these things are
connected in his constitution that are agreeable one to another. — So God
justifies a believer according to his revealed constitution, without doubt,
because he sees something in this qualification that, as the case stands,
renders it a fit thing that such should be justified: whether it be because
faith is the instrument, or as it were the hand, by which he that has purchased
justification is apprehended and accepted, or because it is the acceptance
itself, or whatever else. To be justified, is to be approved of God as a proper
subject of pardon, with a right to eternal life. Therefore, when it is said that
we are justified by faith, what else can be understood by it, than that faith is
that by which we are rendered approvable, fitly so, and indeed, as the case
stands, proper subjects of this benefit?

This is something
different from faith being the condition of justification, though
inseparably connected with justification. So are many other things besides
faith, and yet nothing in us but faith renders it meet that we should have
justification assigned to us: as I shall presently show in answer to the next
inquiry, viz.

2. How this is said
to be by faith alone, without any manner of virtue or goodness of our
own. This may seem to some to be attended with two difficulties, viz. how
this can be said to be by faith alone, without any virtue or goodness of ours,
when faith itself is a virtue, and one part of our goodness, and is not only
some manner of goodness of ours, but is a very excellent qualification, and one
chief part of the inherent holiness of a Christian? And if it be a part of our
inherent goodness or excellency (whether it be this part or any other) that
renders it a condecent or congruous thing that we should have this benefit of
Christ assigned to us, what is this less than what they mean who talk of a merit
of congruity? And moreover, if this part of our Christian holiness qualifies us,
in the sight of God, for this benefit of Christ, and renders it a fit or meet
thing, in his sight, that we should have it, why not other parts of holiness,
and conformity to God, which are also very excellent, and have as much of the
image of Christ in them, and are no less lovely in God’s eyes, qualify us as
much, and have as much influence to render us meet, in God’s sight, for such a
benefit as this? Therefore I answer,

When it is said,
that we are not justified by any righteousness or goodness of our own,
what is meant is that it is not out of respect to the excellency or goodness of
any qualifications or acts in us whatsoever, that God judges it meet that this
benefit of Christ should be ours. It is not, in any wise, on account of any
excellency or value that there is in faith, that it appears in the sight of God
a meet thing, that he who believes should have this benefit of Christ assigned
to him, but purely from the relation faith has to the person in whom this
benefit is to be had, or as it unites to that mediator, in and by whom we are
justified. Here, for the greater clearness, I would particularly explain myself
under several propositions,

(1.) It is certain
that there is some union or relation that the people of Christ stand in to him,
that is expressed in Scripture, from time to time, by being in Christ,
and is represented frequently by those metaphors of being members of Christ, or
being united to him as members to the head, and branches to the stock, and is
compared to a marriage union between husband and wife. I do not now pretend to
determine of what sort this union is. Nor is it necessary to my present purpose
to enter into any manner of disputes about it. If any are disgusted at the word union,
as obscure and unintelligible, the word relation equally serves my
purpose. I do not now desire to determine any more about it, than all, of all
sorts, will readily allow, viz. that there is a peculiar relation
between true Christians and Christ, which there is not between him and others,
and which is signified by those metaphorical expressions in Scripture, of being
in Christ, being members of Christ, etc.

(2.) This relation
or union to Christ, whereby Christians are said to be in Christ (whatever
it be), is the ground of their right to his benefits. This needs no proof: the
reason of the thing, at first blush, demonstrates it. It is exceeding evident
also by Scripture, 1 John 5:12, “He that hath the Son, hath life; and he that
hath not the Son, hath not life.” 1 Cor. 1:30, “Of him are ye in Christ
Jesus, who of God is made unto us — righteousness.” First we must be in
him, and then he will be made righteousness or justification to us. Eph.
1:6, “Who hath made us accepted in the beloved.” Our being in him is
the ground of our being accepted. So it is in those unions to which the Holy
Ghost has thought fit to compare this. The union of the members of the
body with the head, is the ground of their partaking of the life of the head. It
is the union of the branches to the stock, which is the ground of their
partaking of the sap and life of the stock. It is the relation of the
wife to the husband, that is the ground of her joint interest in his estate:
they are looked upon, in several respects, as one in law. So there is a legal
union between Christ and true Christians, so that (as all except Socinians
allow) one, in some respects, is accepted for the other by the supreme Judge.

(3.) And thus it is
that faith is the qualification in any person that renders it meet in the sight
of God that he should be looked upon as having Christ’s satisfaction and
righteousness belonging to him, viz. because it is that in him which, on
his part, makes up this union between him and Christ. By what has been just
now observed, it is a person’s being, according to scripture phrase, in
Christ, that is the ground of having his satisfaction and merits belonging
to him, and a right to the benefits procured thereby. The reason of it is plain:
it is easy to see how our having Christ’s merits and benefits belonging to us,
follows from our having (if I may so speak) Christ himself belonging to
us, or our being united to him. And if so, it must also be easy to see how, or
in what manner, that in a person, which on his part makes up the union
between his soul and Christ, should be the things on the account of which God
looks on it as meet that he should have Christ’s merits belonging to him. It
is a very different thing for God to assign to a particular person a right to
Christ’s merits and benefits from regard to a qualification in him in this
respect, from his doing it for him out of respect to the value or
loveliness of that qualification, or as a reward of its excellency.

As there is nobody
but what will allow that there is a peculiar relation between Christ and
his true disciples, by which they are in some sense in Scripture said to be one.
So I suppose there is nobody but what will allow, that there may be something
that the true Christian does on his part, whereby he is active in
coming into this relation or union: some uniting act, or that which is
done towards this union or relation (or whatever any please to call it) on
the Christian’s part. Now faith I suppose to be this act.

I do not now
pretend to define justifying faith, or to determine precisely how much is
contained in it, but only to determine thus much concerning it, viz. That
it is that by which the soul, which before was separate and alienated from
Christ, unites itself to him, or ceases to be any longer in that state of
alienation, and comes into that forementioned union or relation to him, or, to
use the scripture phrase, it is that by which the soul comes to Christ, and receives
him. This is evident by the Scriptures using these very expressions to
signify faith. John 6:35-39, “He that cometh to me, shall never hunger;
and he that believeth on me, shall never thirst. But I said unto you,
that ye also have seen me and believe not. All that the Father giveth me, shall come
to me; and him that cometh to me, I will in no wise cast out. For I
came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent
me.” Verse 40, “And this is the will of him that sent me, that every one
which seeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting life; and
I will raise him up the last day.” — John 5:38-40, “Whom he hath sent, him
ye believe not. Search the Scriptures, for — they are they which
testify of me. And ye will not come unto me, that ye might have life.”
Verse 43, 44, “I am come in my Father’s name, and ye receive me not:
if another shall come in his own name, him ye will receive. How can ye believe,
which receive honor one of another?” — John 1:12, “But as many as received
him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that
believe on his name.” If it be said that these are obscure figures of speech,
which however they might be well understood of old among those who commonly used
such metaphors, are with difficulty understood now. I allow, that the
expressions of receiving Christ and coming to Christ, are
metaphorical expressions. If I should allow them to be obscure metaphors, yet
this much at least is certainly plain in them, viz. that faith is that by
which those who before were separated, and at a distance from Christ (that is to
say, were not so related and united to him as his people are), cease to be any
longer at such a distance, and come into that relation and nearness, unless they
are so unintelligible, that nothing at all can be understood by them.

God does not give
those that believe a union with or an interest in the Savior as a reward
for faith, but only because faith is the soul’s active uniting with
Christ, or is itself the very act of unition, on their part. God sees it
fit, that in order to a union being established between two intelligent active
beings or persons, so as that they should be looked upon as one, there should be
the mutual act of both, that each should receive the other, as actively joining
themselves one to another. God, in requiring this in order to an union with
Christ as one of his people, treats men as reasonable creatures, capable of act
and choice, and hence sees it fit that they only who are one with Christ by
their own act, should be looked upon as one in law. What is real
in the union between Christ and his people, is the foundation of what is legal:
that is, it is something really in them, and between them, uniting them,
that is the ground of the suitableness of their being accounted as one by the
judge. And if there be any act or qualification in believers of that
uniting nature, that it is meet on that account the judge should look upon them
and accept them as one, no wonder that upon the account of the same act or
qualification, he should accept the satisfaction and merits of the one for the
other, as if these were their own satisfaction and merits. This necessarily
follows, or rather is implied.

And thus it is that
faith justifies, or gives an interest in Christ’s satisfaction and merits, and
a right to the benefits procured thereby, viz. as it thus makes Christ
and the believer one in the acceptance of the supreme Judge. It is by
faith that we have a title to eternal life, because it is by faith that we have
the Son of God, by whom life is. The apostle John in these words, 1 John 5:12,
“He that hath the Son hath life,” seems evidently to have respect to those
words of Christ, of which he gives an account in his gospel, chap. 3:36, “He
that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life; and he that believeth not the
Son, shall not see life.” And where the Scripture speaks of faith as the
soul’s receiving or coming to Christ, it also speaks of this receiving, coming
to, or joining with Christ, as the ground of an interest in his benefits. To as
many as received him, “to them gave he power” to become the sons of God. Ye
will not come unto me, “that ye might have life.” And there is a wide
difference between its being suitable that Christ’s satisfaction and merits
should be theirs who believe, because an interest in that satisfaction and merit
is a fit reward of faith — or a suitable testimony of God’s respect
to the amiableness and excellency of that grace — and its being suitable that
Christ’s satisfaction and merits should be theirs, because Christ and they are
so united, that in the eyes of the Judge they may be looked upon and taken as
one.

Although, on
account of faith in the believer, it is in the sight of God fit and congruous,
both that he who believes should be looked upon as in Christ, and also as having
an interest in his merits, in the way that has been now explained. Yet it
appears that this is very wide from a meritof congruity, or
indeed any moral congruity at all to either. There is a twofold fitness
to a state. I know not how to give them distinguishing names, otherwise than by
calling the one a moral, and the other a natural fitness. A person
has a moral fitness for a state, when his moral excellency commends him to it,
or when his being put into such a good state is but a suitable testimony of
regard to the moral excellency, or value, or amiableness of any of his
qualifications or acts. A person has a natural fitness for a state, when it
appears meet and condecent that he should be in such a state or circumstances,
only from the natural concord or agreeableness there is between such
qualifications and such circumstances: not because the qualifications are lovely
or unlovely, but only because the qualifications and the circumstances are like
one another, or do in their nature suit and agree or unite one to another. And
it is on this latter account only that God looks on it fit by a natural fitness,
that he whose heart sincerely unites itself to Christ as his Savior, should be
looked upon as united to that Savior, and so having an interest in him, and not
from any moral fitness there is between the excellency of such a qualification
as faith, and such a glorious blessedness as the having an interest in Christ.
God’s bestowing Christ and his benefits on a soul in consequence of faith, out
of regard only to the natural concord there is between such a qualification of a
soul, and such a union with Christ, and interest in him, makes the case very
widely different from what it would be, if he bestowed this from regard to any
moral suitableness. For, in the former case, it is only from God’s love of
order that he bestows these things on the account of faith: in the latter, God
does it out of love to the grace of faith itself. — God will neither look on
Christ’s merits as ours, nor adjudge his benefits to us, till we be in Christ.
Nor will he look upon us as being in him, without an active unition of our
hearts and souls to him, because he is a wise being, and delights in order and
not in confusion, and that things should be together or asunder according to
their nature. His making such a constitution is a testimony of his love of
order. Whereas if it were out of regard to any moral fitness or suitableness
between faith and such blessedness, it would be a testimony of his love to the
act or qualification itself. The one supposes this divine constitution to be a
manifestation of God’s regard to the beauty of the act of faith. The other
only supposes it to be a manifestation of his regard to the beauty of that order
that there is in uniting those things that have a natural agreement and
congruity, and unition of the one with the other. Indeed a moral suitableness or
fitness to a state includes a natural. For, if there be a moral suitableness
that a person should be in such a state, there is also a natural suitableness,
but such a natural suitableness, as I have described, by no means necessarily
includes a moral.

This is plainly
what our divines intend when they say, that faith does not justify as a work,
or a righteousness, viz. that it does not justify as a part of our moral
goodness or excellency, or that it does not justify as man was to have been
justified by the covenant of works, which was, to have a title to eternal life
given him of God, in testimony of his pleasedness with his works, or his regard
to the inherent excellency and beauty of his obedience. And this is certainly
what the apostle Paul means, when he so much insists upon it, that we are not
justified by works, viz. that we are not justified by them as good works,
or by any goodness, value, or excellency of our works. For the proof of this I
shall at present mention but one thing, and that is, the apostle from time to
time speaking of our not being justified by works, as the thing that excludes
all boasting, Eph. 2:9, Rom. 3:27, and chap. 4:2. Now which way do works give
occasion for boasting, but as good? What do men use to boast of, but of
something they suppose good or excellent? And on what account do they boast of
anything, but for the supposed excellency that is in it?

From these things
we may learn in what manner faith is the only condition of justification and
salvation. For though it be not the only condition, so as alone truly to have
the place of a condition in a hypothetical proposition, in which justification
and salvation are the consequent. Yet it is the condition of justification in a
manner peculiar to it, and so that nothing else has a parallel influence with
it, because faith includes the whole act of unition to Christ as a Savior. The
entire active uniting of the soul, or the whole of what is called coming to
Christ, and receiving of him, is called faith in Scripture. However other things
may be no less excellent than faith, yet it is not the nature of any other
graces or virtues directly to close with Christ as a mediator, any further than
they enter into the constitution of justifying faith, and do belong to its
nature.

Thus I have
explained my meaning, in asserting it as a doctrine of the gospel, that we are
justified by faith only, without any manner of goodness of our own.

I now proceed,

II. To the proof of
it, which I shall endeavor to produce in the following arguments.

First, such
is our case, and the state of things, that neither faith, nor any other
qualifications, or act or course of acts, does or can render it suitable that a
person should have an interest in the Savior, and so a title to his benefits, on
account of an excellency therein, or any other way, than as something in him may
unite him to the Savior. It is not suitable that God should give fallen man an
interest in Christ and his merits, as a testimony of his respect to anything
whatsoever as a loveliness in him, and that because it is not meet, till a
sinner is actually justified, than anything in him should be accepted of God, as
any excellency or amiableness of his person. Or that God, by any act, should in
any manner or degree testify any pleasedness with him, or favor towards him, on
the account of anything inherent in him, and that for two reasons:

1. The nature of
things will not admit of it. And this appears from the infinite guilt that the
sinner till justified is under, which arises from the infinite evil or
heinousness of sin. But because this is what some deny, I would therefore first
establish that point, and show that sin is a thing that is indeed properly of
infinite heinousness, and then show the consequence that it cannot be suitable,
till the sinner is actually justified, that God should by any act testify
pleasedness with or acceptance of any excellency or amiableness of his person.

That the evil and
demerit of sin is infinitely great, is most demonstrably evident, because what
the evil or iniquity of sin consists in, is the violating of an obligation, or
doing what we should not do. Therefore by how much the greater the obligation is
that is violated, by so much the greater is the iniquity of the violation. But
certainly our obligation to love or honor any being is great in proportion to
the greatness or excellency of that being, or his worthiness to be loved and
honored. We are under greater obligations to love a more lovely being than a
less lovely. If a being be infinitely excellent and lovely, our obligations to
love him are therein infinitely great. The matter is so plain, it seems needless
to say much about it.

Some have argued
exceeding strangely against the infinite evil of sin, from its being committed
against an infinite object, that then it may as well be argued, that there is
also an infinite value or worthiness in holiness and love to God, because that
also has an infinite object. Whereas the argument, from parity of reason, will
carry it in the reverse. The sin of the creature against God is ill-deserving in
proportion to the distance there is between God and the creature. The greatness
of the object, and the meanness of the subject, aggravates it. But it is the
reverse with regard to the worthiness of the respect of the creature of God. It
is worthless (and not worthy) in proportion to the meanness of the subject. So
much the greater the distance between God and the creature, so much the less is
the creature’s respect worthy of God’s notice or regard. The unworthiness of
sin or opposition to God rises and is great in proportion to the dignity of the
object and inferiority of the subject. But on the contrary, the value of respect
rises in proportion to the value of the subject, and that for this plain reason,
viz. that the evil of disrespect is in proportion to the obligation that
lies upon the subject to the object, which obligation is most evidently
increased by the excellency and superiority of the object. But on the contrary,
the worthiness of respect to a being is in proportion to the obligation that
lies on him who is the object (or rather the reason he has), to regard the
subject, which certainly is in proportion to the subject’s value or
excellency. Sin or disrespect is evil or heinous in proportion to the degree of
what it denies in the object, and as it were takes from it, viz. its
excellency and worthiness of respect. On the contrary, respect is valuable in
proportion to the value of what is given to the object in that respect, which
undoubtedly (other things being equal) is great in proportion to the subject’s
value, or worthiness of regard, because the subject in giving his respect, can
give no more than himself. So far as he gives his respect, he gives himself to
the object, and therefore his gift is of greater or lesser value in proportion
to the value of himself.

Hence (by the way)
the love, honor, and obedience of Christ towards God, has infinite value, from
the excellency and dignity of the person in whom these qualifications were
inherent. The reason why we needed a person of infinite dignity to obey for us,
was because of our infinite comparative meanness, who had disobeyed, whereby our
disobedience was infinitely aggravated. We needed one, the worthiness of whose
obedience might be answerable to the unworthiness of our disobedience, and
therefore needed one who was as great and worthy as we were unworthy.

Another objection
(that perhaps may be thought hardly worth mentioning) is, that to suppose sin to
be infinitely heinous, is to make all sins equally heinous: for how can any sin
be more than infinitely heinous? But all that can be argued hence is, that no
sin can be greater with respect to that aggravation, the worthiness of the
object against whom it is committed. One sin cannot be more aggravated than
another in that respect, because the aggravation of every sin is
infinite, but that does not hinder that some sins may be more heinous than
others in other respects: as if we should suppose a cylinder infinitely
long, cannot be greater in that respect, viz. with respect to the length
of it. But yet it may be doubled and trebled, and make a thousand-fold more, by
the increase of other dimensions. Of sins that are all infinitely heinous, some
may be more heinous than others, as well as of divers punishments that are all
infinitely dreadful calamities, or all of them infinitely exceeding all finite
calamities, so that there is no finite calamity, however great, but what is
infinitely less dreadful, or more eligible than any of them. Yet some of them
may be a thousand times more dreadful than others. A punishment may be
infinitely dreadful by reason of the infinite duration of it, and therefore
cannot be greater with respect to that aggravation of it, viz. its
length of continuance, but yet may be vastly more terrible on other accounts.

Having thus, as I
imagine, made it clear that all sin is infinitely heinous, and consequently that
the sinner, before he is justified, is under infinite guilt in God’s sight, it
now remains that I show the consequence, or how it follows from hence, that it
is not suitable that God should give the sinner an interest in Christ’s
merits, and so a title to his benefits, from regard to any qualification, or
act, or course of acts in him, on the account of any excellency or goodness
whatsoever therein, but only as uniting to Christ; or (which fully implies it)
that it is not suitable that God, by any act, should, in any manner or degree,
testify any acceptance of, or pleasedness with anything, as any virtue, or
excellency, or any part of loveliness, or valuableness in his person, until he
is actually already interested in Christ’s merits. From the premises it
follows, that before the sinner is already interested in Christ, and justified,
it is impossible God should have any acceptance of, or pleasedness with the
person of the sinner, as in any degree lovely in his sight, or indeed less the
object of his displeasure and wrath. For, by the supposition, the sinner still
remains infinitely guilty in the sight of God, for guilt is not removed but by
pardon. But to suppose the sinner already pardoned, is to suppose him already
justified, which is contrary to the supposition. But if the sinner still remains
infinitely guilty in God’s sight, that is the same thing as still to be beheld
of God as infinitely the object of his displeasure and wrath, or infinitely
hateful in his eyes. If so, where is any room for anything in him, to be
accepted as some valuableness or acceptability of him in God’s sight, or for
any act of favor of any kind towards him, or any gift whatsoever to him, in
testimony of God’s respect to and acceptance of something of him lovely and
pleasing? If we should suppose that a sinner could have faith, or some other
grace in his heart, and yet remain separate from Christ, and that he is not
looked upon as being in Christ, or having any relation to him, it would not be
meet that such true grace should be accepted of God as any loveliness of his
person in the sight of God. If it should be accepted as the loveliness of the
person, that would be to accept the person as in some degree lovely to God. But
this cannot be consistent with his still remaining under infinite guilt, or
infinite unworthiness in God’s sight, which that goodness has no worthiness to
balance. — While God beholds the man as separate from Christ, he must behold
him as he is in himself, and so his goodness cannot be beheld by God, but as
taken with his guilt and hatefulness, and as put in the scales with it. So his
goodness is nothing, because there is a finite on the balance against an
infinite whose proportion to it is nothing. In such a case, if the man be looked
on as he is in himself, the excess of the weight in one scale above another,
must be looked upon as the quality of the man. These contraries being beheld
together, one takes from another, as one number is subtracted from another, and
the man must be looked upon in God’s sight according to the remainder. For
here, by the supposition, all acts of grace or favor, in not imputing the guilt
as it is, are excluded, because that supposes a degree of pardon, and that
supposes justification, which is contrary to what is supposed, viz. that
the sinner is not already justified. Therefore things must be taken strictly as
they are, and so the man is still infinitely unworthy and hateful in God’s
sight, as he was before, without diminution, because his goodness bears no
proportion to his unworthiness, and therefore when taken together is nothing.

Hence may be more
clearly seen the force of that expression in the text, of believing on him that justifieth
the ungodly. For though there is indeed something in man that is really and
spiritually good, prior to justification, yet there is nothing that is accepted
as any godliness or excellency of the person, till after justification. Goodness
or loveliness of the person in the acceptance of God, in any degree, is not to
be considered as prior but posterior in the order and method of God’s
proceeding in this affair. Though a respect to the natural suitableness between
such a qualification, and such a state, does go before justification, yet the
acceptance even of faith as any goodness or loveliness of the believer, follows
justification. The goodness is on the forementioned account justly looked upon
as nothing, until the man is justified: And therefore the man is respected in
justification, as in himself altogether hateful. Thus the nature of things will
not admit of a man having an interest given him in the merits or benefits of a
Savior, on the account of anything as a righteousness, or a virtue, or
excellency in him.

2. A divine
constitution antecedent to that which establishes justification by a Savior (and
indeed to any need of a Savior), stands in the way of it, viz. that
original constitution or law which man was put under, by which constitution or
law the sinner is condemned, because he is a violator of that law, and stands
condemned, till he has actually an interest in the Savior, through whom he is
set at liberty from that condemnation. But to suppose that God gives a man an
interest in Christ in reward for his righteousness or virtue, is
inconsistent with his still remaining under condemnation till he has an interest
in Christ, because it supposes, that the sinner’s virtue is accepted, and he
accepted for it, before he has an interest in Christ, inasmuch as an interest in
Christ is given as a reward of his virtue. But the virtue must first be
accepted, before it is rewarded, and the man must first be accepted for his
virtue before he is rewarded for it with so great and glorious a reward. For the
very notion of a reward, is some good bestowed in testimony of respect to and
acceptance of virtue in the person rewarded. It does not consist with the honor
of the majesty of the King of heaven and earth, to accept of anything from a
condemned malefactor, condemned by the justice of his own holy law, till that
condemnation be removed. And then, such acceptance is inconsistent with, and
contradictory to such remaining condemnation, for the law condemns him that
violates it, to be totally rejected and cast off by God. But how can a man
continue under this condemnation, i. e. continue utterly rejected and
cast off by God, and yet his righteousness or virtue be accepted, and he himself
accepted on the account of it, so as to have so glorious a reward as an interest
in Christ bestowed as a testimony of that acceptance?

I know that the
answer will be that we now are not subject to that constitution which mankind
were at first put under, but that God, in mercy to mankind, has abolished that
rigorous constitution, and put us under a new law, and introduced a more mild
constitution, and that the constitution or law itself not remaining, there is no
need of supposing that the condemnation of it remains, to stand in the way of
the acceptance of our virtue. And indeed there is no other way of avoiding this
difficulty. The condemnation of the law must stand in force against a man, till
he is actually interested in the Savior who has satisfied and answered the law,
so as effectually to prevent any acceptance of his virtue, either before, or in
order to such an interest, unless the law or constitution itself be abolished.
But the scheme of those modern divines by whom this is maintained, seems to
contain a great deal of absurdity and self-contradiction. They hold that the old
law given to Adam, which requires perfect obedience, is entirely repealed, and
that instead of it we are put under a new law, which requires no more than
imperfect sincere obedience, in compliance with our poor, infirm, impotent
circumstances since the fall, whereby we are unable to perform that perfect
obedience that was required by the first law. For they strenuously maintain,
that it would be unjust in God to require anything of us that is beyond our
present power and ability to perform, and yet they hold, that Christ died to
satisfy for the imperfections of our obedience, that so our imperfect obedience
might be accepted instead of perfect. Now, how can these things hang together? I
would ask what law these imperfections of our obedience are a breach of? If they
are a breach of no law, then they are not sins, and if they be not sins, what
need of Christ’s dying to satisfy for them? But if they are sins, and so the
breach of some law, what law is it? They cannot be a breach of their new law,
for that requires no other than imperfect obedience, or obedience with
imperfections. They cannot be a breach of the old law, for that they say is
entirely abolished, and we never were under it, and we cannot break a law that
we never were under. They say it would not be just in God to exact of us perfect
obedience, because it would not be just in God to require more of us than we can
perform in our present state, and to punish us for failing of it. Therefore by
their own scheme, the imperfections of our obedience do not deserve to be
punished. What need therefore of Christ’s dying to satisfy for them? What need
of Christ’s suffering to satisfy for that which is no fault, and in its own
nature deserves no suffering? What need of Christ’s dying to purchase that our
imperfect obedience should be accepted, when according to their scheme it would
be unjust in itself that any other obedience than imperfect should be required?
What need of Christ’s dying to make way for God’s accepting such an
obedience, as it would in itself be unjust in him not to accept? Is there any
need of Christ’s dying to persuade God not to do unjustly? If it be said that
Christ died to satisfy that law for us, that so we might not be under that law,
but might be delivered from it, that so there might be room for us to be under a
more mild law, still I would inquire, What need of Christ’s dying that we
might not be under a law that (according to their scheme) it would in itself be
unjust that we should be under, because in our present state we are not able to
keep it? What need of Christ’s dying that we might not be under a law that it
would be unjust that we should be under, whether Christ died or no?

Thus far I have
argued principally from reason, and the nature of things: — I proceed now to
the

Second
argument, which is that this is a doctrine which the Holy Scriptures, the
revelation that God has given us of his mind and will — by which alone we can
never come to know how those who have offended God can come to be accepted of
him, and justified in his sight — is exceeding full. The apostle Paul is
abundant in teaching, that “we are justified by faith alone, without the works
of the law.” (Rom. 3:28; 4:5; 5:1; Gal. 2:16; 3:8; 3:11; 3:24) There is no one
doctrine that he insists so much upon, and that he handles with so much
distinctness, explaining, giving reasons and answering objections.

Here it is not
denied by any, that the apostle does assert that we are justified by faith,
without the works of the law, because the words are express. But only it is said
that we take his words wrong, and understand that by them that never entered
into his heart, in that when he excludes the works of the law, we understand him
of the whole law of God, or the rule which he has given to mankind to walk by:
whereas all that he intends is the ceremonial law.

Some that oppose
this doctrine indeed say that the apostle sometimes means that it is by faith, i.e.
a hearty embracing the gospel in its first act only, or without any preceding
holy life, that persons are admitted into a justified state. But say they, it is
by a persevering obedience that they are continued in a justified state, and it
is by this that they are finally justified. But this is the same thing as to
say, that a man on his first embracing the gospel is conditionally justified and
pardoned. To pardon sin is to free the sinner from the punishment of it, or from
that eternal misery that is due it. Therefore if a person is pardoned, or freed
from this misery, on his first embracing the gospel, and yet not finally freed,
but his actual freedom still depends on some condition yet to be performed, it
is inconceivable how he can be pardoned otherwise than conditionally: that is,
he is not properly actually pardoned, and freed from punishment, but only he has
God’s promise that he shall be pardoned on future conditions. God promises
him, that now, if he perseveres in obedience, he shall be finally pardoned or
actually freed from hell, which is to make just nothing at all of the
apostle’s great doctrine of justification by faith alone. Such a conditional
pardon is no pardon or justification at all any more than all mankind have,
whether they embrace the gospel or no. For they all have a promise of final
justification on conditions of future sincere obedience, as much as he that
embraces the gospel. But not to dispute about this, we will suppose that there
may be something or other at the sinner’s first embracing the gospel, that may
properly be called justification or pardon, and yet that final justification, or
real freedom from the punishment of sin, is still suspended on conditions
hitherto unfulfilled. Yet they who hold that sinners are thus justified on
embracing the gospel, suppose that they are justified by this, no otherwise than
as it is a leading act of obedience, or at least as virtue and moral goodness in
them, and therefore would be excluded by the apostle as much as any other virtue
or obedience, if it be allowed that he means the moral law, when he excludes
works of the law. And therefore, if that point be yielded, that the apostle
means the moral, and not only the ceremonial, law, their whole scheme falls to
the ground.

And because the
issue of the whole argument from those texts in St. Paul’s epistles depends on
the determination of this point, I would be particular in the discussion of it.

Some of our
opponents in this doctrine of justification, when they deny that by the law the
apostle means the moral law or the whole rule of life which God has given to
mankind, seem to choose to express themselves thus: that the apostle only
intends the Mosaic dispensation. But this comes to just the same thing as if
they said that the apostle only means to exclude the works of the ceremonial
law. For when they say that it is intended only that we are not justified by the
works of the Mosaic dispensation, if they mean anything by it, it must be, that
we are not justified by attending and observing what is Mosaic in that
dispensation, or by what was peculiar to it, and wherein it differed from the
Christian dispensation, which is the same as that which is ceremonial and
positive, and not moral, in that administration. So that this is what I have to
disprove, viz. that the apostle, when he speaks of works of the law in
this affair, means only works of the ceremonial law, or those observances that
were peculiar to the Mosaic administration.

And here it must be
noted, that nobody controverts it with them, whether the works of the ceremonial
law be not included, or whether the apostle does not particularly argue against
justification by circumcision, and other ceremonial observances. But all in
question is whether when he denies justification by works of the law, he is to
be understood only of the ceremonial law, or whether the moral law be not also
implied and intended. And therefore those arguments which are brought to prove
that the apostle meant the ceremonial law, are nothing to the purpose, unless
they prove that the apostle meant those only.

What is much
insisted on is that it was the judaizing Christians being so fond of
circumcision and other ceremonies of the law, and depending so much on them,
which was the very occasion of the apostle’s writing as he does against
justification by the works of the law. But supposing it were so, that their
trusting in works of the ceremonial law were the sole occasion of the
apostle’s writing (which yet there is no reason to allow, as may appear
afterwards), if their trusting in a particular work, as a work of righteousness,
was all that gave occasion to the apostle to write, how does it follow, that
therefore the apostle did not upon that occasion write against trusting in all
works of righteousness whatsoever? Where is the absurdity of supposing that
the apostle might take occasion, from his observing some to trust in a certain
work as trusting in any works of righteousness at all, and that it was a very
proper occasion too? Yea, it would have been unavoidable for the apostle to have
argued against trusting in a particular work, in the quality of a work of
righteousness, which quality was general, but he must therein argue against
trusting in works of righteousness in general. Supposing it had been some other
particular sort of works that was the occasion of the apostle’s writing, as
for instance, works of charity, and the apostle should hence take occasion to
write to them not to trust in their works, could the apostle by that be
understood of no other works besides works of charity? Would it have been absurd
to understand him as writing against trusting in any work at all, because it was
their trusting to a particular work that gave occasion to his writing?

Another thing
alleged, as an evidence that the apostle means the ceremonial law — when he
says, we cannot be justified by the works of the law — is that he uses this
argument to prove it, viz. that the law he speaks of was given so long
after the covenant with Abraham, in Gal. 3:17, “And this I say, that the
covenant that was confirmed before of God in Christ, the law which was four
hundred and thirty years after, cannot disannul.” But, say they, it was only
the Mosaic administration, and not the covenant of works, that was given so long
after. But the apostle’s argument seems manifestly to be mistaken by them. The
apostle does not speak of a law that began to exist four hundred and thirty
years after. If he did, there would be some force in their objection, but he has
respect to a certain solemn transaction, well known among the Jews by the phrase
“the giving of the law,” which was at Mount Sinai (Exo. 19, 20) consisting
especially in God’s giving the ten commandments (which is the moral law) with
a terrible voice, which law he afterwards gave in tables of stone. This
transaction the Jews in the apostle’s time misinterpreted. They looked upon it
as God’s establishing that law as a rule of justification. Against this
conceit of theirs the apostle brings this invincible argument, viz. that
God would never go about to disannul his covenant with Abraham, which was
plainly a covenant of grace, by a transaction with his posterity, that was so
long after it, and was plainly built upon it. He would not overthrow a covenant
of grace that he had long before established with Abraham, for him and his seed
(which is often mentioned as the ground of God’s making them his people), by
now establishing a covenant of works with them at Mount Sinai, as the Jews and
judaizing Christians supposed.

But that the
apostle does not mean only works of the ceremonial law, when he excludes works
of the law in justification, but also of the moral law, and all works of
obedience, virtue, and righteousness whatsoever, may appear by the following
things.

1. The apostle does
not only say that we are not justified by the works of the law, but that we are
not justified by works, using a general term, as in our text, “to him
that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth,” etc.; and in the 6th
verse, “God imputeth righteousness without works;” and Rom. 11:6, “And if
by grace, then is it no more of works, otherwise grace is no more grace: but if
it be of works, then it is no more grace; otherwise work is no more work.” So,
Eph. 2:8, 9, “For by grace are ye saved, through faith, — not of works;”
by which, there is no reason in the world to understand the apostle of any other
than works in general, as correlates of a reward, or good works, or works of
virtue and righteousness. When the apostle says, we are justified or saved not
by works, without any such term annexed, as the law, or any other addition to
limit the expression, what warrant have any to confine it to works of a
particular law or institution, excluding others? Are not observances of other
divine laws works, as well as of that? It seems to be allowed by the divines in
the Arminian scheme, in their interpretation of several of those texts where the
apostle only mentions works, without any addition, that he means our own good
works in general. But then, they say, he only means to exclude any proper merit
in those works. But to say the apostle means one thing when he says, we are not
justified by works, and another when he says, we are not justified by the works
of the law, when we find the expressions mixed and used in the same discourse,
and when the apostle is evidently upon the same argument, is very unreasonable.
It is to dodge and fly from Scripture, rather than open and yield ourselves to
its teachings.

2. In the third
chapter of Romans, our having been guilty of breaches of the moral law, is an
argument that the apostle uses, why we cannot be justified by the works of the
Old Testament, that all are under sin: “There is none righteous, no not one:
their throat is as an open sepulchre; with their tongues they have used deceit:
their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness; and their feet swift to shed
blood.” And so he goes on, mentioning only those things that are breaches of
the moral law. And then when he has done, his conclusion is, in the 19th and
20th verses, “Now we know that whatsoever things the law saith, it saith to
them that are under the law, that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world
may become guilty before God. Therefore, by the deeds of the law, shall no flesh
be justified in his sight.” This is most evidently his argument, because all
had sinned (as it was said in the 9th verse), and been guilty of those breaches
of the moral law that he had mentioned (and it is repeated over again, verse
23), “For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God;” therefore
none at all can be justified by the deeds of the law. Now if the apostle meant
only, that we are not justified by the deeds of the ceremonial law, what kind of
arguing would that be, “Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness, their
feet are swift to shed blood?” therefore they cannot be justified by the deeds
of the Mosaic administration. They are guilty of the breaches of the moral law,
and therefore they cannot be justified by the deeds of the ceremonial law!
Doubtless, the apostle’s argument is that the very same law they have broken,
can never justify them as observers of it, because every law necessarily
condemns it violators. And therefore our breaches of the moral law argue no
more, than that we cannot be justified by that law we have broken.

And it may be
noted, that the apostle’s argument here is the same that I have already used, viz.
that as we are in ourselves, and out of Christ, we are under the condemnation of
that original law or constitution that God established with mankind. And
therefore it is no way fit that anything we do, any virtue or obedience of ours,
should be accepted, or we accepted on the account of it.

3. The apostle, in
all the preceding part of this epistle, wherever he has the phrase, the law,
evidently intends the moral law principally. As in the 12th verse of the
foregoing chapter: “For as many as have sinned without law, shall also perish
without law.” It is evidently the written moral law the apostle means, by the
next verse but one, “For when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by
nature the things contained in the law;” that is, the moral law that the
Gentiles have by nature. And so the next verse, “Which show the work of the
law written in their hearts.” It is the moral law, and not the ceremonial,
that is written in the hearts of those who are destitute of divine revelation.
And so in the 18th verse, “Thou approvest the things that are more excellent,
being instructed out of the law.” It is the moral law that shows us the nature
of things, and teaches us what is excellent, 20th verse, “Thou hast a form of
knowledge and truth in the law.” It is the moral law, as is evident by what
follows, verse 22, 23, “Thou that sayest a man should not commit adultery,
dost thou commit adultery? Thou that abhorrest idols, dost thou commit
sacrilege? Thou that makest thy boast of the law, through breaking the law,
dishonourest thou God?” Adultery, idolatry, and sacrilege, surely are the
breaking of the moral, and not the ceremonial law. So in the 27th verse, “And
shall not uncircumcision which is by nature, if it fulfil the law, judge thee,
who by the letter and circumcision dost transgress the law?” i.e. the
Gentiles, that you despise because uncircumcised, if they live moral and holy
lives, in obedience to the moral law, shall condemn you though circumcised. And
so there is not one place in all the preceding part of the epistle, where the
apostle speaks of the law, but that he most apparently intends principally the
moral law. And yet when the apostle, in continuance of the same discourse, comes
to tell us, that we cannot be justified by the works of the law, then they will
needs have it, that he means only the ceremonial law. Yea, though all this
discourse about the moral law, showing how the Jews as well as Gentiles have
violated it, is evidently preparatory and introductory to that doctrine, Rom.
3:20, “That no flesh,” that is, none of mankind, neither Jews nor Gentiles,
“can be justified by the works of the law.”

4. It is evident
that when the apostle says, we cannot be justified by the works of the law, he
means the moral as well as ceremonial law, by his giving this reason for it,
that “by the law is the knowledge of sin,” as Rom. 3:20, “By the deeds of
the law shall no flesh be justified in his sight; for by the law is the
knowledge of sin.” Now that law by which we come to the knowledge of sin, is
the moral law chiefly and primarily. If this argument of the apostle be good,
“that we cannot be justified by the deeds of the law, because it is by the law
that we come to the knowledge of sin;” then it proves that we cannot be
justified by the deeds of the moral law, nor by the precepts of Christianity;
for by them is the knowledge of sin. If the reason be good, then where the
reason holds, the truth holds. It is a miserable shift, and a violent force put
upon the words, to say that the meaning is, that by the law of circumcision is
the knowledge of sin, because circumcision signifying the taking away of sin,
puts men in mind of sin. The plain meaning of the apostle is that as the law
most strictly forbids sin, it tends to convince us of sin, and bring our own
consciences to condemn us, instead of justifying of us: that the use of it is to
declare to us our own guilt and unworthiness, which is the reverse of justifying
and approving of us as virtuous or worthy. This is the apostle’s meaning, if
we will allow him to be his own expositor. For he himself, in this very epistle,
explains to us how it is that by the law we have the knowledge of sin, and that
it is by the law’s forbidding sin, Rom. 7:7, “I had not known sin, but by
the law; for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not
covet.” There the apostle determines two things: first, that the way in which
“by the law is the knowledge of sin,” is by the law’s forbidding sin, and
secondly, which is more directly still to the purpose, he determines that it is
the moral law by which we come to the knowledge of sin. “For,” says he, “I
had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet.” Now it is
the moral, and not the ceremonial law, that says, “Thou shalt not covet.”
Therefore, when the apostle argues that by the deeds of the law no flesh living
shall be justified, because by the law is the knowledge of sin, his argument
proves (unless he was mistaken as to the force of his argument), that we cannot
be justified by the deeds of the moral law.

5. It is evident
that the apostle does not mean only the ceremonial law, because he gives this
reason why we have righteousness, and a title to the privilege of God’s
children, not by the law, but by faith, “that the law worketh wrath.” Rom.
4:13-16, “For the promise that he should be the heir of the world, was not to
Abraham, or to his seed through the law, but through righteousness of faith. For
if they which are of the law be heirs, faith is made void, and the promise made
of none effect. Because the law worketh wrath: for where no law is, there is no
transgression. Therefore it is of faith, that it might be by grace.” Now the
way in which the law works wrath, by the apostle’s own account, in the reason
he himself annexes, is by forbidding sin, and aggravating the guilt of the
transgression. “For,” says he, “where no law is, there is no
transgression:” And so, Rom. 7:13, “That sin by the commandment might become
exceeding sinful.” If, therefore, this reason of the apostle be good, it is
much stronger against justification by the moral law than the ceremonial law.
For it is by transgressions of the moral law chiefly that there comes wrath: for
they are most strictly forbidden, and most terribly threatened.

6. It is evident
that when the apostle says, we are not justified by the works of the law, that
he excludes all our own virtue, goodness, or excellency, by that reason he gives
for it, viz. “That boasting might be excluded.” Rom. 3:26, 27, 28,
“To declare, I say, at this time his righteousness: that he might be just, and
the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. Where is boasting then? It is
excluded. By what law? of works? Nay; but by the law of faith. Therefore we
conclude, that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law.” Eph.
2:8, 9, “For by grace are ye saved, through faith; and that not of yourselves;
it is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast.” Now what are
men wont to boast of, but what they esteem their own goodness or excellency? If
we are not justified by works of the ceremonial law, yet how does that exclude
boasting, as long as we are justified by our own excellency, or virtue and
goodness of our own, or works of righteousness which we have done?

But it is said,
that boasting is excluded, as circumcision was excluded, which was what the Jews
especially used to glory in, and value themselves upon, above other nations.

To this I answer,
that the Jews were not only used to boast of circumcision, but were notorious
for boasting of their moral righteousness. The Jews of those days were generally
admirers and followers of the Pharisees, who were full of their boasts of their
moral righteousness; as we may see by the example of the Pharisee mentioned in
the 18th of Luke, which Christ mentions as describing the general temper of that
sect: “Lord,” says he, “I thank thee, that I am not as other men, an
extortioner, nor unjust, nor an adulterer.” The works that he boasts of were
chiefly moral works: he depended on the works of the law for justification. And
therefore Christ tells us, that the publican, that renounced all his own
righteousness, “went down to his house justified rather than he.” And
elsewhere, we read of the Pharisees praying in the corners of the streets, and
sounding a trumpet before them when they did alms. But those works which they so
vainly boasted of were moral works. And not only so, but what the apostle
in this very epistle condemns the Jews for, is their boasting of the moral law.
Rom. 2:22, 23, “Thou that sayest a man should not commit adultery, do thou
commit adultery? Thou that abhorrest idols, dost thou commit sacrilege? Thou
that makest thy boast of the law, through breaking the law, dishonourest thou
God?” The law here mentioned that they made their boast of, was that of which
adultery, idolatry, and sacrilege, were the breaches, which is the moral law. So
that this is the boasting which the apostle condemns them for. And therefore, if
they were justified by the works of this law, then how comes he to say that
their boasting is excluded? And besides, when they boasted of the rites of the
ceremonial law, it was under a notion of its being a part of their own goodness
or excellency, or what made them holier and more lovely in the sight of God than
other people. If they were not justified by this part of their own supposed
goodness or holiness, yet if they were by another, how did that exclude
boasting? How was their boasting excluded, unless all goodness or excellency of
their own was excluded

7. The reason given
by the apostle why we can be justified only by faith, and not by the works of
the law, in the 3d chapter of Galations viz. “That they that are under
the law, are under the curse,” makes it evident that he does not mean only the
ceremonial law. In that chapter the apostle had particularly insisted upon it,
that Abraham was justified by faith, and that it is by faith only, and not by
the works of the law, that we can be justified, and become the children of
Abraham, and be made partakers of the blessing of Abraham: and he gives this
reason for it in the 10th verse: “For as many as are of the works of the law,
are under the curse; for it is written, Cursed is every one that continueth not
in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them.” It is
manifest that these words, cited from Deuteronomy, are spoken not only with
regard to the ceremonial law, but the whole law of God to mankind and chiefly
the moral law, and that all mankind are therefore as they are in themselves
under the curse, not only while the ceremonial law lasted, but now since that
has ceased. And therefore all who are justified, are redeemed from that curse,
by Christ’s bearing it for them; as in verse 13, “Christ hath redeemed us
from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed
is every one that hangeth on a tree.” Now therefore, either its being said
that he is cursed who continueth not in all things which are written in the book
of the law to do them, is a good reason why we cannot be justified by the works
of that law of which it is so said, or it is not: if it be, then it is a good
reason why we cannot be justified by the works of the moral law, and of the
whole rule which God has given to mankind to walk by. For the words are spoken
of the moral as well as the ceremonial law, and reach every command or precept
which God has given to mankind, and chiefly the moral precepts, which are most
strictly enjoined, and the violations of which in both the New Testament and the
Old, and in the books of Moses themselves, are threatened with the most dreadful
curse.

8. The apostle in
like manner argues against our being justified by our own righteousness, as he
does against being justified by the works of the law; and evidently uses the
expressions, of our own righteousness, and works of the law,
promiscuously, and as signifying the same thing. It is particularly evident by
Rom. 10:3, “For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and going about
to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the
righteousness of God.” Here it is plain that the same thing is asserted as in
the two last verses but one of the foregoing chapter, “But Israel, which
followed after the law of righteousness, hath not attained to the law of
righteousness. Wherefore? because they sought it, not by faith, but as it were
by the works of the law.” And it is very unreasonable, upon several accounts,
to suppose that the apostle, by their own righteousness, intends only their
ceremonial righteousness. For when the apostle warns us against trusting in our
own righteousness of justification, doubtless it is fair to interpret the
expression in an agreement with other scriptures. Here we are warned, not to
think that it is for the sake of our own righteousness that we obtain God’s
favor and blessing: as particularly in Deu. 9:4-6, “Speak not thou in thine
heart, after that the Lord thy God hath cast them out from before thee, saying,
For my righteousness the Lord hath brought me in to possess this land: but for
the wickedness of these nations the Lord doth drive them out from before thee.
Not for thy righteousness, or for the uprightness of thine heart, dost thou go
to possess their land: but for the wickedness of these nations, the Lord thy God
doth drive them out from before thee, and that he may perform the word which he
sware unto thy fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Understand therefore, that
the Lord thy God giveth thee not this good land to possess it, for thy
righteousness; for thou art a stiff-necked people.” None will pretend that
here the expression thy righteousness, signifies only a ceremonial
righteousness, but all virtue or goodness of their own — yea, and the inward
goodness of the heart, as well as the outward goodness of life; which appears by
the beginning of the 5th verse, “Not for thy righteousness, or for the
uprightness of thy heart;” and also by the antithesis in the 6th verse, “Not
for thy righteousness, for thou art a stiff-necked people.” Their stiff-neckedness
was their moral wickedness, obstinacy, and perverseness of heart. By
righteousness, therefore, on the contrary, is meant their moral virtue, and
rectitude of heart and life. This is what I would argue from hence, that the
expression of our own righteousness, when used in Scripture with relation
to the favor of God — and when we are warned against looking upon it as that
by which that favor, or the fruits of it, are obtained — does not signify only
a ceremonial righteousness, but all manner of goodness of our own.

The Jews also, in
the New Testament, are condemned for trusting in their own righteousness in this
sense, Luke 18:9, etc. “And he spake this parable unto certain that trusted in
themselves that they were righteous.” This intends chiefly a moral
righteousness, as appears by the parable itself, in which we have an account of
the prayer of the Pharisee, wherein the things that he mentions as what he
trusts in, are chiefly moral qualifications and performances, viz. that
he was not an extortioner, unjust, nor an adulterer, etc.

But we need not go
to the writings of other penmen of the Scripture. If we will allow the apostle
Paul to be his own interpreter, he — when he speaks of our own righteousness
as that by which we are not justified or saved — does not mean only a
ceremonial righteousness, nor does he only intend a way of religion and serving
God, of our own choosing, without divine warrant or prescription. But by our own
righteousness he means the same as a righteousness of our own doing, whether it
be a service or righteousness of God’s prescribing, or our own unwarranted
performing. Let it be an obedience to the ceremonial law, or a gospel obedience,
or what it will: if it be a righteousness of our own doing, it is excluded by
the apostle in this affair, as is evident by Tit. 3:5, “Not by works of
righteousness which we have done.” — But I would more particularly insist on
this text; and therefore this may be the

9th argument: that
the apostle, when he denies justification by works, works of the law, and our
own righteousness, does not mean works of the ceremonial law only. Tit. 3:3-7,
“For we ourselves also were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving
divers lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, and hating one
another. But after that the kindness and love of God our Saviour toward men
appeared, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his
mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy
Ghost; which he shed on us abundantly, through Jesus Christ our Saviour; that
being justified by his grace we should be made heirs according to the hope of
eternal life.” Works of righteousness that we have done are here excluded, as
what we are neither saved nor justified by. The apostle expressly says, we are
not saved by them, and it is evident that when he says this, he has respect to
the affair of justification. And that he means, we are not saved by them
in not being justified by them, as by the next verse but one, which is
part of the same sentence, “That being justified by his grace, we should be
made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.”

It is several ways
manifest, that the apostle in this text, by “works of righteousness which we
have done,” does not mean only works of the ceremonial law. It appears by the
3d verse, “For we ourselves also were sometimes foolish, disobedient,
deceived, serving divers lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy,
hateful, and hating one another.” These are breaches of the moral law, that
the apostle observes they lived in before they were justified: and it is most
plain that it is this which gives occasion to the apostle to observe, as he does
in the 5th verse, that is was not by works of righteousness which they had done,
that they were saved or justified.

But we need not go
to the context, it is most apparent from the words themselves, that the apostle
does not mean only works of the ceremonial law. If he had only said, it is not
by our own works of righteousness. What could we understand by works of
righteousness, but only righteous works, or, which is the same thing, good
works? And not say, that it is by our own righteous works that we are justified,
though not by one particular kind of righteous works, would certainly be a
contradiction to such an assertion. But, the works are rendered yet more strong,
plain, and determined in their sense, by those additional words, which we
have done, which shows that the apostle intends to exclude all our own
righteous or virtuous works universally. If it should be asserted concerning any
commodity, treasure, or precious jewel, that it could not be procured by money,
and not only so, but to make the assertion the more strong, it should be
asserted with additional words, that it could not be procured by money that men
possess, how unreasonable would it be, after all, to say that all that was meant
was, that it could not be procured with brass money.

And what renders
the interpreting of this text, as intending works of the ceremonial law, yet
more unreasonable, is that these works were indeed no works of righteousness at
all, but were only falsely supposed to be so by the Jews. And this our opponents
in this doctrine also suppose is the very reason why we are not justified by
them, because they are not works of righteousness, or because (the ceremonial
law being now abrogated) there is no obedience in them. But how absurd is it to
say, that the apostle, when he says we are not justified by works of
righteousness that we have done, meant only works of the ceremonial law, and
that for that very reason, because they are not works of righteousness? To
illustrate this by the forementioned comparison: If it should be asserted, that
such a thing could not be procured by money that men possess, how ridiculous
would it be to say, that the meaning only was, that it could not be procured by
counterfeit money, and that for that reason, because it was not money. What
Scripture will stand before men, if they will take liberty to manage Scripture
thus? Or what one text is there in the Bible that may not at this rate be
explained all away, and perverted to any sense men please?

But further, if we
should allow that the apostle intends only to oppose justification by works of
the ceremonial law in this text, yet it is evident by the expression he uses,
that he means to oppose it under that notion, or in that quality, of their being
works of righteousness of our own doing. But if the apostle argues against our
being justified by works of the ceremonial law, under the notion of their being
of that nature and kind, viz. works of our own doing, then it will follow
that the apostle’s argument is strong against, not only those, but all of that
nature and kind, even all that are of our own doing.

If there were not
other text in the Bible about justification but this, this would clearly and
invincibly prove that we are not justified by any of our own goodness, virtue,
or righteousness, or for the excellency or righteousness of anything that we
have done in religion, because it is here so fully and strongly asserted. But
this text abundantly confirms other texts of the apostle, where he denies
justification by works of the law. No doubt can be rationally made, but that the
apostle, when he shows, that God does not save us by “works of righteousness
that we have done,” verse 5, and that so we are “justified by grace,”
verse 7, herein opposing salvation by works, and salvation by grace — means
the same works as he does in other places, where he in like manner
opposes works and grace, as in Rom. 11:6, “And if by grace, then it is no more
of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then is it no
more grace: otherwise work is no more work.” And the same works as in Rom.
4:4, “Now to him that worketh, is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of
debt.” And the same works that are spoken of in the context of the 24th verse
of the foregoing chapter, which the apostle there calls “works of the law,
being justified freely by his grace.” And of the 4th chapter, 16th verse,
“Therefore it is of faith, that it might be by grace.” Where in the context
the righteousness of faith is opposed to the righteousness of the law: for here
God’s saving us according to his mercy, and justifying us by grace, is opposed
to saving us by works of righteousness that we have done. In the same manner as
in those places, justifying us by his grace, is opposed to justifying us by
works of the law.

10. The apostle
could not mean only works of the ceremonial law, when he says, we are not
justified by the works of the law, because it is asserted of the saints under
the Old Testament as well as New. If men are justified by their sincere
obedience, it will then follow that formerly, before the ceremonial law was
abrogated, men were justified by the works of the ceremonial law, as well as the
moral. For if we are justified by our sincere obedience, then it alters not the
case, whether the commands be moral or positive, provided they be God’s
commands, and our obedience be obedience to God. And so the case must be just
the same under the Old Testament, with the works of the moral law and
ceremonial, according to the measure of the virtue of obedience there was in
either. It is true, their obedience to the ceremonial law would have nothing to
do in the affair of justification, unless it was sincere, and so neither would
the works of the moral law. If obedience was the thing, then obedience to the
ceremonial law, while that stood in force, and obedience to the moral law, had
just the same sort of concern, according to the proportion of obedience that
consists in each. As now under the New Testament, if obedience is what we are
justified by, that obedience must doubtless comprehend obedience to all God’s
commands now in force, to the positive precepts of attendance on baptism and the
Lord’s supper, as well as moral precepts. If obedience be the thing, it is not
because it is obedience to such a kind of commands, but because it is obedience.
So that by this supposition, the saints under the Old Testament were justified,
at least in part, by their obedience to the ceremonial law.

But it is evident
that the saints under the Old Testament were not justified, in any measure, by
the works of the ceremonial law. This may be proved, proceeding on the foot of
our adversaries’ own interpretation of the apostle’s phrase, “the works of
the law,” and supposing them to mean by it only the works of the ceremonial
law. To instance in David, it is evident that he was not justified in any wise
by the works of the ceremonial law, by Rom. 4:6-8, “Even as David also
describeth the blessedness of the man unto whom God imputeth righteousness
without works, saying, Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose
sins are covered. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin.” It
is plain that the apostle is here speaking of justification, from the preceding
verse, and all the context; and the thing spoken of, viz. forgiving
iniquities and covering sins, is what our adversaries themselves suppose to be
justification, and even the whole of justification. This David, speaking of
himself, says (by the apostle’s interpretation) that he had without works.
For it is manifest that David, in the words here cited, from the beginning of
the 32d Psalm, has a special respect to himself: he speaks of his own sins being
forgiven and not imputed to him: as appears by the words that immediately
follow, “When I kept silence, my bones waxed old; through my roaring all the
day long. For day and night thy hand was heavy upon me: my moisture is turned
into the drought of summer. I acknowledged my sin unto thee, and mine iniquity
have I not hid; I said, I will confess my transgressions unto the Lord; and thou
forgavest the iniquity of my sin.” Let us therefore understand the apostle
which way we will respecting works, when he says, “David describes the
blessedness of the man to whom the Lord imputes righteousness without works,”
whether of all manner of works, or only works of the ceremonial law, yet it is
evident at least, that David was not justified by works of the ceremonial law.
Therefore here is the argument: if our own obedience be that by which men are
justified, then under the Old Testament, men were justified partly by obedience
to the ceremonial law (as has been proved). But the saints under the Old
Testament were not justified partly by the works of the ceremonial law.
Therefore men’s own obedience is not that by which they are justified.

11. Another
argument that the apostle, when he speaks of the two opposite ways of
justification, one by the works of the law, and the other by faith, does not
mean only the works of the ceremonial law, may be taken from Rom. 10:5, 6.
“For Moses describeth the righteousness which is of the law, that the man
which doth those things, shall live by them. But the righteousness which is of
faith, speaketh on this wise,” etc. — Here two things are evident.

(1) That the
apostle here speaks of the same two opposite ways of justification, one by the
righteousness which is of the law, the other by faith, that he had treated of in
the former part of the epistle. And therefore it must be the same law that is
here spoken of. The same law is here meant as in the last verses of the
foregoing chapter, where he says, the Jews had “not attained to the law of
righteousness. Wherefore? Because they sought it, not by faith, but as it were
by the works of the law;” as is plain, because the apostle is still speaking
of the same thing. The words are a continuation of the same discourse, as may be
seen at first glance, by anyone that looks on the context.

(2.) It is manifest
that Moses, when he describes the righteousness which is of the law, or the way
of justification by the law, in the words here cited, “He that doth those
things, shall live in them,” does not speak only, nor chiefly, of the works of
the ceremonial law; for none will pretend that God ever made such a covenant
with man, that he who kept the ceremonial law should live in it, or that there
ever was a time, that it was chiefly by the works of the ceremonial law that men
lived and were justified. Yea, it is manifest by the forementioned instance of
David, mentioned in the 4th of Romans, that there never was a time wherein men
were justified in any measure by the works of the ceremonial law, as has been
just now shown. Moses therefore, in those words which, the apostle says, are a
description of the righteousness which is of the law, cannot mean only the
ceremonial law. And therefor it follows, that when the apostle speaks of
justification by the works of the law, as opposite to justification by faith, he
does not mean only the ceremonial law, but also the works of the moral law,
which are the things spoken of by Moses, when he says, “He that doth those
things, shall live in them.” And these are the things which the apostle in
this very place is arguing that we cannot be justified by, as is evident by the
last verses of the preceding chapter; “But Israel, which followed after the
law of righteousness, hath not attained to the law of righteousness. Wherefore?
Because they sought it, not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law,”
etc. And in the 3d verse of this chapter, “For they being ignorant of God’s
righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not
submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God.”

And further, how
can the apostle’s description that he here gives from Moses, of this exploded
way of justification by the works of the law, consist with the Arminian scheme,
of a way of justification by the virtue of a sincere obedience, that still
remains as the true and only way of justification under the gospel? It is most
apparent that it is the design of the apostle to give a description of both the
legal rejected and the evangelical valid ways of justification, in that wherein
they are distinguished the one from the other. But how is it, that “he who
doth those things, shall live in them,” that wherein the way of
justification by the works of the law is distinguished from that in which
Christians under the gospel are justified, according to their scheme. For still,
according to them, it may be said, in the same manner, of the precepts of the
gospel, he that does these things, shall live in them. The difference lies only
in the things to be done, but not at all in that the doing of them is not the
condition of living in them, just in the one case, as in the other. The words,
“He that does them, shall live in them,” will serve just as well for a
description of the latter as the former. By the apostle’s saying, the
righteousness of the law is described thus, he that doth these things, shall
live in them. But the righteousness of faith saith thus, plainly intimates that
the righteousness of faith saith otherwise, and in an opposite manner. Besides,
if these words cited from Moses are actually said by him of the moral law as
well as ceremonial, as it is most evident they are, it renders it still more
absurd to suppose them mentioned by the apostle, as the very note of distinction
between justification by a ceremonial obedience, and a moral sincere obedience,
as the Arminians must suppose.

Thus I have spoken
to a second argument, to prove that we are not justified by any manner of virtue
or goodness of our own, viz. that to suppose otherwise, is contrary to
the doctrine directly urged, and abundantly insisted on, by the apostle Paul in
his epistles.

I now proceed to a

Third
argument, viz. that to suppose that we are justified by our own sincere
obedience, or any of our own virtue or goodness, derogates from gospel grace.

That scheme of
justification that manifestly takes from, or diminishes the grace of God, is
undoubtedly to be rejected; for it is the declared design of God in the gospel
to exalt the freedom and riches of his grace, in that method of justification of
sinners, and way of admitting them to his favor, and the blessed fruits of it,
which it declares. The Scripture teaches, that the way of justification
appointed in the gospel covenant is appointed for that end, that free grace
might be expressed, and glorified, Rom. 4:16, “Therefore it is of faith, that
it might be by grace.” The exercising and magnifying of free grace in the
gospel contrivance for the justification and salvation of sinners, is evidently
the chief design of it. And this freedom and riches of grace in the gospel is
everywhere spoken of in Scripture as the chief glory of it. Therefore that
doctrine which derogates from the free grace of God in justifying sinners, as it
is most opposite to God’s design, so it must be exceedingly offensive to him.

Those who maintain,
that we are justified by our own sincere obedience, pretend that their scheme
does not diminish the grace of the gospel; for they say, that the grace of God
is wonderfully manifested in appointing such a way and method of salvation by
sincere obedience, in assisting us to perform such an obedience, and in
accepting our imperfect obedience, instead of perfect.

Let us therefore
examine that matter, whether their scheme of a man’s being justified by his
own virtue and sincere obedience, does derogate from the grace of God or no, or
whether free grace is not more exalted in supposing, as we do, that we are
justified without any manner of goodness of our own. In order to this, I will
lay down the self-evident

Proposition, that
whatsoever that be by which the abundant benevolence of the giver is expressed,
and gratitude in the receiver is obliged, that magnifies free grace. This I
suppose none will ever controvert or dispute. And it is not much less evident,
that it does both show a more abundant benevolence in the giver when he shows
kindness without goodness or excellency in the object, to move him to it, and
that it enhances the obligation to gratitude in the receiver.

1. It shows a more
abundant goodness in the giver, when he shows kindness without any excellency in
our persons or actions that should move the giver to love and beneficence. For
it certainly shows the more abundant and overflowing goodness, or disposition to
communicate good, by how much the less loveliness or excellency there is to
entice beneficence. The less there is in the receiver to draw goodwill and
kindness, it argues the more of the principle of goodwill and kindness in the
giver. One that has but a little of a principle of love and benevolence, may be
drawn to do good, and to show kindness, when there is a great deal to draw him,
or when there is much excellency and loveliness in the object to move goodwill.
When he whose goodness and benevolence is more abundant, [he] will show kindness
where there is less to draw it forth. For he does not so much need to have it
drawn from without, he has enough of the principle within to move him of itself.
Where there is most of the principle, there it is most sufficient for itself,
and stands in least need of something without to excite it. For certainly a more
abundant goodness more easily flows forth with less to impel or draw it, than
where there is less, or, which is the same thing, the more anyone is disposed of
himself, the less he needs from without himself, to put him upon it, or stir him
up to it. And therefore his kindness and goodness appears the more exceeding
great, when it is bestowed without any excellency or loveliness at all in the
receiver, or when the receiver is respected in the gift, as wholly without
excellency. And much more still when the benevolence of the giver not only finds
nothing in the receiver to draw it, but a great deal of hatefulness to repel it.
The abundance of goodness is then manifested, not only in flowing forth without
anything extrinsic to put it forward, but in overcoming great repulsion in the
object. And then does kindness and love appear most triumphant, and wonderfully
great, when the receiver is not only wholly without all excellency or beauty to
attract it, but altogether, yea, infinitely vile and hateful.

2. It is apparent
also that it enhances the obligation to gratitude in the receiver. This is
agreeable to the common sense of mankind, that the less worthy or excellent the
object of benevolence, or the receiver of kindness is, the more he is obliged,
and the greater gratitude is due. He therefore is most of all obliged, that
receives kindness without any goodness or excellency in himself, but with a
total and universal hatefulness. And as it is agreeable to the common sense of
mankind, so it is agreeable to the Word of God. How often does God in the
Scripture insist on this argument with men, to move them to love him, and to
acknowledge his kindness? How much does he insist on this as an obligation to
gratitude, that they are so sinful, and undeserving, and ill-deserving?

Therefore it
certainly follows, that the doctrine which teaches that God, when he justifies a
man, and shows him such great kindness as to give him a right to eternal life,
does not do it for any obedience, or any manner of goodness of his, but that
justification respects a man as ungodly, and wholly without any manner of
virtue, beauty, or excellency. I say, this doctrine does certainly more exalt
the free grace of God in justification, and man’s obligation to gratitude for
such a favor, than the contrary doctrine, viz. that God, in showing this
kindness to man, respects him as sincerely obedient and virtuous, and as having
something in him that is truly excellent and lovely, and acceptable in his
sight, and that this goodness or excellency of man is the very fundamental
condition of the bestowment of that kindness on him, or of distinguishing him
from others by that benefit.

But I hasten to a

Fourth
argument for the truth of the doctrine: that to suppose a man is justified by
his own virtue or obedience, derogates from the honor of the Mediator, and
ascribes that to man’s virtue which belongs only to the righteousness of
Christ: It puts man in Christ’s stead, and makes him his own savior, in a
respect in which Christ only is his Savior. And so it is a doctrine contrary to
the nature and design of the gospel, which is to abase man, and to ascribe all
the glory of our salvation to Christ the Redeemer. It is inconsistent with the
doctrine of the imputation of Christ’s righteousness, which is a gospel
doctrine.

Here I would explain
what we mean by the imputation of Christ’s righteousness. Prove
the thing intended by it to be true. Show that this doctrine is utterly
inconsistent with the doctrine of our being justified by our own virtue or
sincere obedience.

1. I would explain
what we mean by the imputation of Christ’s righteousness. Sometimes the
expression is taken by our divines in a larger sense, for the imputation of all
that Christ did and suffered for our redemption, whereby we are free from guilt,
and stand righteous in the sight of God, and so implies the imputation both of
Christ’s satisfaction and obedience. But here I intend it in a stricter sense,
for the imputation of that righteousness or moral goodness that consists in the
obedience of Christ. — And by that righteousness being imputed to us,
is meant no other than this, that the righteousness of Christ is accepted for
us, and admitted instead of that perfect inherent righteousness which ought to
be in ourselves. Christ’s perfect obedience shall be reckoned to our account,
so that we shall have the benefit of it, as though we had performed it
ourselves. And so we suppose that a title to eternal life is given us as the
reward of this righteousness. The Scripture uses the word impute in this
sense, viz. for reckoning anything belonging to any person, to another
person’s account: As Phm. 18, “If he hath wronged thee, or oweth thee ought,
put that on mine account.”

The opposers of
this doctrine suppose that there is an absurdity in supposing that God imputes
Christ’s obedience to us. It is to suppose that God is mistaken, and thinks
that we performed that obedience which Christ performed. But why cannot that
righteousness be reckoned to our account, and be accepted for us, without any
such absurdity? Why is there any more absurdity in it, than in a merchant’s
transferring debt or credit from one man’s account to another, when one man
pays a price for another, so that it shall be accepted as if that other had paid
it? Why is there any more absurdity in supposing that Christ’s obedience is
imputed to us, than that his satisfaction is imputed? If Christ has suffered the
penalty of the law in our stead, then it will follow, that his suffering that
penalty is imputed to us, that is, accepted for us, and in our stead, and is
reckoned to our account, as though we had suffered it. But why may not his
obeying the law of God be as rationally reckoned to our account, as his
suffering the penalty of the law? Why may not a price to bring into debt, be as
rationally transferred from one person’s account to another, as a price to pay
a debt? Having thus explained what we mean by the imputation of Christ’s
righteousness, I proceed,

2. To prove that
the righteousness of Christ is thus imputed.

(1.) There is the
very same need of Christ’s obeying the law in our stead, in order to the
reward, as of his suffering the penalty of the law in our stead, in order to our
escaping the penalty, and the same reason why one should be accepted on our
account, as the other. There is the same need of one as the other, that the law
of God might be answered: one was as requisite to answer the law as the other.
It is certain, that was the reason why there was need that Christ should suffer
the penalty for us, even that the law might be answered. For this the Scripture
plainly teaches. This is given as the reason why Christ was made a curse for us,
that the law threatened a curse to us, Gal. 3:10, 13. But the same law that
fixes the curse of God as the consequence of not continuing in all things
written in the law to do them (verse 10) has as much fixed doing those things as
an antecedent of living in them (as verse 12). There is as much connection
established in one case as in the other. There is therefore exactly the same
need, from the law, of perfect obedience being fulfilled in order to our
obtaining the reward, as there is of death being suffered in order to our
escaping the punishment, or the same necessity by the law, of perfect obedience
preceding life, as there is of disobedience being succeeded by death. The law
is, without doubt, as much of an established rule in one case as in the other.

Christ by suffering
the penalty, and so making atonement for us, only removes the guilt of our sins,
and so sets us in the same state that Adam was in the first moment of his
creation, and it is no more fit that we should obtain eternal life only on that
account, than that Adam should have the reward of eternal life, or of a
confirmed and unalterable state of happiness, the first moments of his
existence, without any obedience at all. Adam was not to have the reward merely
on account of his being innocent. If [that were] so, he would have had it fixed
upon him at once, as soon as ever he was created, for he was as innocent then as
he could be. But he was to have the reward on account of his active obedience:
not on account merely of his not having done ill, but on account of his doing
well.

So on the same
account we have not eternal life merely as void of guilt, which we have by the
atonement of Christ, but on the account of Christ’s active obedience, and
doing well. — Christ is our second federal head, and is called the second Adam
(1 Cor. 15:22), because he acted that part for us, which the first Adam should
have done. When he had undertaken to stand in our stead, he was looked upon and
treated as though he were guilty with our guilt. By his bearing the penalty, he
did as it were free himself from this guilt. But by this the second Adam did
only bring himself into the state in which the first Adam was on the first
moment of his existence, viz. a state of mere freedom from guilt, and
hereby indeed was free from any obligation to suffer punishment. But this being
supposed, there was need of something further, even a positive obedience, in
order to his obtaining, as our second Adam, the reward of eternal life.

God saw meet to
place man first in a state of trial, and not to give him a title to eternal life
as soon as he had made him, because it was his will that he should first give
honor to his authority, by fully submitting to it, in will and act, and
perfectly obeying his law. God insisted upon it, that his holy majesty and law
should have their due acknowledgment and honor from man, such as became the
relation he stood in to that Being who created him, before he would bestow the
reward of confirmed and everlasting happiness upon him. Therefore God gave him a
law that he might have opportunity, by giving due honor to his authority in
obeying it, to obtain this happiness. It therefore became Christ — seeing
that, in assuming man to himself, he sought a title to this eternal happiness
for him after he had broken the law — that he himself should become subject to
God’s authority, and be in the form of a servant, that he might do that honor
to God’s authority for him, by his obedience, which God at first required of
man as the condition of his having a title to that reward. Christ came into the
world to render the honor of God’s authority and law consistent with the
salvation and eternal life of sinners. He came to save them, and yet withal to
assert and vindicate the honor of the lawgiver, and his holy law. Now, if the
sinner, after his sin was satisfied for, had eternal life bestowed upon him
without active righteousness, the honor of his law would not be sufficiently
vindicated. Supposing this were possible, that the sinner could himself, by
suffering, pay the debt, and afterwards be in the same state that he was in
before his probation, that is to say, negatively righteous, or merely without
guilt. If he now at last should have eternal life bestowed upon him, without
performing that condition of obedience, then God would recede from his law, and
would give the promised reward, and his law never have respect and honor shown
to it, in that way of being obeyed. But now Christ, by subjecting himself to the
law, and obeying it, has done great honor to the law, and to the authority of
God who gave it. That so glorious a person should become subject to the law, and
fulfill it, has done much more to honor it, than if mere man had obeyed it. It
was a thing infinitely honorable to God, that a person of infinite dignity was
not ashamed to call him his God, and to adore and obey him as such. This was
more to God’s honor than if any mere creature, of any possible degree of
excellence and dignity, had so done.

It is absolutely
necessary, that in order to a sinner’s being justified, the righteousness of
some other should be reckoned to his account. For it is declared that the person
justified is looked upon as (in himself) ungodly, but God neither will nor can
justify a person without a righteousness. For justification is manifestly a forensic
term, as the word is used in Scripture, and a judicial thing, or the act of
a judge. So that if a person should be justified without a righteousness, the
judgment would not be according to truth. The sentence of justification would be
a false sentence, unless there be a righteousness performed, that is, by the
judge, properly looked upon as his. To say that God does not justify the sinner
without sincere, though an imperfect obedience, does not help the case, for an
imperfect righteousness before a judge is no righteousness. To accept of
something that falls short of the rule, instead of something else that answers
the rule, is no judicial act, or act of a judge, but a pure act of sovereignty.
An imperfect righteousness is no righteousness before a judge: For
“righteousness (as one observes) is a relative thing, and has always relation
to a law. The formal nature of righteousness, properly understood, lies in a
conformity of actions to that which is the rule and measure of them.”
Therefore that only is righteousness in the sight of a judge that answers the
law. The law is the judge’s rule. If he pardons and hides what really is, and
so does not pass sentence according to what things are in themselves, he either
does not act the part of a judge, or else judges falsely. The very notion of
judging is to determine what is, and what is not in anyone’s case. The
judge’s work is twofold: it is to determine first what is fact, and then
whether what is in fact be according to rule, or according to the law. If a
judge has no rule or law established beforehand, by which he should proceed in
judging, he has no foundation to go upon in judging, he has no opportunity to be
a judge, nor is it possible that he should do the part of a judge. To judge
without a law, or rule by which to judge, is impossible. For the very notion of
judging is to determine whether the object of judgment be according to rule.
Therefore God has declared that when he acts as a judge, he will not justify the
wicked, and cannot clear the guilty, and, by parity of reason, cannot justify
without righteousness.

And the scheme of
the old law’s being abrogated, and a new law introduced, will not help at all
in this difficulty. For an imperfect righteousness cannot answer the law of God
we are under, whether that be an old or a new one, for every law requires
perfect obedience to itself. Every rule whatsoever requires perfect conformity
to itself, [and] it is a contradiction to suppose otherwise. For to say, that
there is a law that does not require perfect obedience to itself, is to say that
there is a law that does not require all that it requires. That law that now
forbids sin, is certainly the law that we are now under (let that be an old or a
new one), or else it is not sin. That which is not forbidden, and is the breach
of no law, is no sin. But if we are now forbidden to commit sin, then it is by a
law that we are now under. For surely we are neither under the forbiddings nor
commanding of a law that we are not under. Therefore, if all sin is now
forbidden, then we are now under a law that requires perfect obedience, and
therefore nothing can be accepted as a righteousness in the sight of our Judge,
but perfect righteousness. So that our Judge cannot justify us, unless he sees a
perfect righteousness in some way belonging to us, either performed by
ourselves, or by another, and justly and duly reckoned to our account.

God does, in the
sentence of justification, pronounce a man perfectly righteous, or else he would
need a further justification after he is justified. His sins being removed by
Christ’s atonement, is not sufficient for his justification. For justifying a
man, as has been already shown, is not merely pronouncing him innocent, or
without guilt, but standing right with regard to the rule that he is under, and
righteous unto life. But this, according to the established rule of nature,
reason, and divine appointment, is a positive, perfect righteousness.

As there is the
same need that Christ’s obedience should be reckoned to our account, as that
his atonement should, so there is the same reason why it should. As if Adam had
persevered, and finished his course of obedience, we should have received the
benefit of his obedience, as much as now we have the mischief of his
disobedience. So in like manner, there is reason that we should receive the
benefit of the second Adam’s obedience, as of his atonement of our
disobedience. Believers are represented in Scripture as being so in Christ, as
that they are legally one, or accepted as one, by the Supreme Judge. Christ has
assumed our nature, and has so assumed all, in that nature that belongs to him,
into such an union with himself, that he is become their Head, and has taken
them to be his members. And therefore, what Christ has done in our nature,
whereby he did honor to the law and authority of God by his acts, as well as the
reparation to the honor of the law by his sufferings, is reckoned to the
believer’s account: so as that the believer should be made happy, because it
was so well and worthily done by his Head, as well as freed from being
miserable, because he has suffered for our ill and unworthy doing.

When Christ had
once undertaken with God to stand for us, and put himself under our law, by that
law he was obliged to suffer, and by the same law he was obliged to obey. By the
same law, after he had taken man’s guilt upon him, he himself being our
surety, could not be acquitted till he had suffered, nor rewarded till he had
obeyed. But he was not acquitted as a private person, but as our Head, and
believers are acquitted in his acquittal. Nor was he accepted to a reward for
his obedience, as a private person, but as our Head, and we are accepted to a
reward in his acceptance. The Scripture teaches us, that when Christ was raised
from the dead, he was justified, which justification, as I have already shown,
implies both his acquittal from our guilt, and his acceptance to the exaltation
and glory that was the reward of his obedience. But believers, as soon as they
believe, are admitted to partake with Christ in this his justification. Hence we
are told, that he was “raised again for our justification,” (Rom. 4:25)
which is true, not only of that part of his justification that consists in his
acquittal, but also his acceptance to his reward. The Scripture teaches us, that
he is exalted, and gone to heaven to take possession of glory in our name, as
our forerunner, Heb. 6:20. We are as it were, both raised up together with
Christ, and also made to sit together with Christ in heavenly places, and in
him, Eph. 2:6.

If it be objected
here, that there is this reason, why what Christ suffered should be accepted on
our account, rather than the obedience he performed, that he was obliged to
obedience for himself, but was not obliged to suffer but only on our account. To
this I answer that Christ was not obliged, on his own account, to undertake to
obey. Christ in his original circumstances, was in no subjection to the Father,
being altogether equal with him. He was under no obligation to put himself in
man’s stead, and under man’s law, or to put himself into any state of
subjection to God whatsoever. There was a transaction between the Father and the
Son, that was antecedent to Christ’s becoming man, and being made under the
law, wherein he undertook to put himself under the law, and both to obey and to
suffer. In [this] transaction these things were already virtually done in the
sight of God, as is evident by this: that God acted on the ground of that
transaction, justifying and saving sinners, as if the things undertaken had been
actually performed long before they were performed indeed. And therefore,
without doubt, in order to estimate the value and validity of what Christ did
and suffered, we must look back to that transaction, wherein these things were
first undertaken, and virtually done in the sight of God, and see what capacity
and circumstances Christ acted in them. We shall find that Christ was under no
manner of obligation, either to obey the law, or to suffer its penalty. After
this he was equally under obligation to both, for henceforward he stood as our
surety or representative. And therefore this consequent obligation may be as
much of an objection against the validity of his suffering the penalty, as
against his obedience. But if we look to that original transaction between the
Father and the Son, wherein both these were undertaken and accepted as virtually
done in the sight of the Father, we shall find Christ acting with regard to both
as one perfectly in his own right, and under no manner of previous obligation to
hinder the validity of either.

(2.) To suppose
that all Christ does is only to make atonement for us by suffering, is to make
him our Savior but in part. It is to rob him of half his glory as a Savior. For
if so, all that he does is to deliver us from hell: he does not purchase heaven
for us. The adverse scheme supposes that he purchases heaven for us, in that he
satisfies for the imperfections of our obedience and so purchases that our
sincere imperfect obedience might be accepted as the condition of eternal life,
and so purchases an opportunity for us to obtain heaven by our own obedience.
But to purchase heaven for us only in this sense, is to purchase it in no sense
at all. For all of it comes to no more than a satisfaction for our sins, or
removing the penalty by suffering in our stead. For all the purchasing they
speak of, that our imperfect obedience should be accepted, is only his
satisfying for the sinful imperfection of our obedience, or (which is the same
thing) making atonement for the sin that our obedience is attended with. But
that is not purchasing heaven, merely to set us at liberty again, that we may go
and get heaven by what we do ourselves. All that Christ does is only to pay a
debt for us. There is no positive purchase of any good. We are taught in
Scripture that heaven is purchased for us. It is called the purchased
possession, Eph. 1:14. The gospel proposes the eternal inheritance, not to
be acquired, as the first covenant did, but as already acquired and purchased.
But he that pays a man’s debt for him, and so delivers him from slavery,
cannot be said to purchase an estate for him, merely because he sets him at
liberty, so that henceforward he has an opportunity to get an estate by his own
hand labor. So that according to this scheme, the saints in heaven have no
reason to thank Christ for purchasing heaven for them, or redeeming them to God,
and making them kings and priests, as we have an account that they do, in Rev.
5:9, 10.

(3.) Justification
by the righteousness and obedience of Christ, is a doctrine that the Scripture
teaches in very full terms, Rom. 5:18, 19, “By the righteousness of one, the
free gift came upon all men unto justification of life. For as by one man’s
disobedience many were made sinners, so, by the obedience of one, shall all be
made righteous.” Here in one verse we are told that we have justification by
Christ’s righteousness, and that there might be no room to understand the
righteousness spoken of, merely of Christ’s atonement by his suffering the
penalty. In the next verse it is put in other terms, and asserted that it is by
Christ’s obedience we are made righteous. It is scarcely possible anything
should be more full and determined. The terms, taken singly, are such as fix
their own meaning, and taken together, they fix the meaning of each other. The
words show that we are justified by that righteousness of Christ which consists
in his obedience, and that we are made righteous or justified by that obedience
of his, that is, his righteousness, or moral goodness before God.

Here possibly it
may be objected, that this text means only, that we are justified by Christ’s
passive obedience.

To this I answer,
whether we call it active or passive, it alters not the case as to the present
argument, as long as it is evident by the words that it is not merely under the
notion of an atonement for disobedience, or a satisfaction for unrighteousness,
but under the notion of a positive obedience, and a righteousness, or moral
goodness, that it justifies us, or makes us righteous. Because both the words righteousness
and obedience are used, and used too as the opposites to sin and
disobedience, and an offense. “Therefore as by the offence of one, judgment
came upon all men to condemnation; even so, by the righteousness of one, the
free gift came upon all men to justification of life. For as by one man’s
disobedience many were made sinners; so, by the obedience of one, shall many be
made righteousness.” Now, what can be meant by righteousness, when spoken of
as the opposite to sin, or moral evil, but moral goodness? What is the
righteousness that is the opposite of an offense, but the behavior that is well
pleasing? And what can be meant by obedience, when spoken of as the opposite of
disobedience, or going contrary to a command, but a positive obeying and an
actual complying with the command? So that there is no room for any invented
distinction of active and passive, to hurt the argument from this scripture. For
it is evident by it, as anything can be, that believers are justified by the
righteousness and obedience of Christ, under the notion of his moral goodness;
— his positive obeying, and actual complying with the commands of God, and
that behavior which, because of its conformity to his commands, was
well-pleasing in his sight. This is all that ever any need to desire to have
granted in this dispute.

By this it appears,
that if Christ’s dying be here included in the words righteousness and obedience,
it is not merely as a propitiation, or bearing a penalty of a broken law in our
stead, but as his voluntary submitting and yielding himself to those sufferings,
was an act of obedience to the Father’s commands, and so was a part of his
positive righteousness, or moral goodness.

Indeed all
obedience considered under the notion of righteousness, is something active,
something done in voluntary compliance with a command; whether it may be done
without suffering, or whether it be hard and difficult. Yet as it is obedience,
righteousness, or moral goodness, it must be considered as something voluntary
and active. If anyone is commanded to go through difficulties and sufferings,
and he, in compliance with this command, voluntarily does it, he properly obeys
in so doing; and as he voluntarily does it in compliance with a command, his
obedience is as active as any whatsoever. It is the same sort of obedience, a
thing of the very same nature, as when a man, in compliance with a command, does
a piece of hard service, or goes through hard labor; and there is no room to
distinguish between such obedience of it, as if it were a thing of quite a
different nature, by such opposite terms as active and passive: all the
disobeying an easy command and a difficult one. But is there from hence any
foundation to make two species of obedience, one active and the other passive?
There is no appearance of any such distinction ever entering into the hearts of
any of the penmen of Scripture.

It is true, that of
late, when a man refuses to obey the precept of a human law, but patiently
yields himself up to suffer the penalty of the law, it is called passive
obedience. But this I suppose is only a modern use of the word obedience.
Surely it is a sense of the word that the Scripture is a perfect stranger to. It
is improperly called obedience, unless there be such a precept in the law, that
he shall yield himself patiently to suffer, to which his so doing shall be an
active voluntary conformity. There may in some sense be said to be a conformity
of the law in a person’s suffering the penalty of the law. But no other
conformity to the law is properly called obedience to it, but an active
voluntary conformity to the precepts of it. The word obey is often found
in Scripture with respect to the law of God to man, but never in any other
sense.

It is true that
Christ’s willingly undergoing those sufferings which he endured, is a
great part of that obedience or righteousness by which we are justified. The
sufferings of Christ are respected in Scripture under a twofold consideration,
either merely as his being substituted for us, or put into our stead, in
suffering the penalty of the law. And so his sufferings are considered as a
satisfaction and propitiation for sin, or as he, in obedience to a law or a
command of the Father, voluntarily submitted himself to those sufferings, and
actively yielded himself up to hear them. So they are considered as his
righteousness, and a part of his active obedience. Christ underwent death in
obedience to the command of the Father, Psa. 40:6-8, “Sacrifice and offering
thou didst not desire, mine ears hast thou opened: burnt-offering and
sin-offering hast thou not required. Then said I, Lo, I come: in the volume of
the book it is written of me, I delight to do thy will, O my God; yea, thy law
is within my heart.” John 10:17-18, “I lay down my life, that I might take
it again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself: I have power to
lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received
of my Father.” John 18:11, “The cup which my Father hath given me, shall I
not drink it?” And this is part, and indeed the principal part, of that active
obedience by which we are justified.

It can be no just
objection against this, that the command of the Father to Christ that he should
lay down his life was no part of the law that we had broken, and therefore, that
his obeying this command could be no part of that obedience that he performed
for us, because we needed that he should obey no other law for us, but only that
which we had broken or failed of obeying. For although it must be the same
legislative authority, whose honor is repaired by Christ’s obedience, that we
have injured by our disobedience, yet there is no need that the law which Christ
obeys should be precisely the same that Adam was to have obeyed, in that sense,
that there should be no positive precepts wanting, nor any added. There was
wanting the precept about the forbidden fruit, and there was added the
ceremonial law. The thing required was perfect obedience. It is no matter
whether the positive precepts that Christ was to obey, were much more than
equivalent to what was wanting, because infinitely more difficult, particularly
the command that he had received to lay down his life, which was his principal
act of obedience, and which, above all other, is concerned in our justification.
As that act of disobedience by which we fell, was disobedience to a positive
precept that Christ never was under, viz. That of abstaining from the
tree of knowledge of good and evil, so that act of obedience by which
principally we are redeemed is obedience to a positive precept, that should try
both Adam’s and Christ’s obedience. Such precepts are the greatest and most
proper trial of obedience, because in them, the mere authority and will of the
legislator is the sole ground of the obligation (and nothing in the nature of
the things themselves), and therefore they are the greatest trial of any
persons’ respect to that authority and will.

The law that Christ
was subject to, and obeyed, was in some sense the same that was given to Adam.
There are innumerable particular duties required by the law only conditionally,
and in such circumstances, are comprehended in some great and general rule of
that law. Thus, for instance, there are innumerable acts of respect and
obedience to men, which are required by the law of nature (which was a law given
to Adam), which yet are not required absolutely, but upon many prerequisite
conditions: as that there be men standing in such relations to us, and that they
give forth such commands, and the like. So many acts of respect and obedience to
God are included, in like manner, in the moral law conditionally, or such and
such things being supposed: as Abraham’s going about to sacrifice his son, the
Jews’ circumcising their children when eight days old, and Adam’s not eating
the forbidden fruit. They are virtually comprehended in the great general rule
of the moral law, that we should obey God, and be subject to him in whatsoever
he pleases to command us. Certainly the moral law does as much require us to
obey God’s positive commands, as it requires us to obey the positive commands
of our parents. And thus all that Adam, and all that Christ was commanded, even
his observing the rites and ceremonies of the Jewish worship, and his laying
down his life, was virtually included in this same great law.

It is no objection
against the last-mentioned thing, even in Christ’s laying down his life, it
being included in the moral law given to Adam, because that law itself allowed
of no occasion for any such thing. For the moral law virtually includes all
right acts, on all possible occasions, even occasions that the law itself allows
not. Thus we are obliged by the moral law to mortify our lusts, and repent of
our sins, though that law allows of no lust to mortify, or sin to repent of.

There is indeed but
one great law of God, and that is the same law that says, “if thou sinnest,
thou shalt die;” and “curses is every one that continues not in all things
contained in this law to do them.” All duties of positive institution are
virtually comprehended in this law: and therefore, if the Jews broke the
ceremonial law, it exposed them to the penalty of the law, or covenant of works,
which threatened, “thou shalt surely die.” The law is the eternal and
unalterable rule of righteousness between God and man, and therefore is the rule
of judgment, but which all that a man does shall be either justified or
condemned; and no sin exposes to damnation, but by the law. So now he that
refuses to obey the precepts that require an attendance on the sacraments of the
New Testament, is exposed to damnation, by virtue of the law or covenant of
works. It may moreover be argued that all sins whatsoever are breaches of the
law or covenant of works, because all sins, even breaches of the positive
precepts, as well as others, have atonement by the death of Christ. But what
Christ died for, was to satisfy the law, or to bear the curse of the law; as
appears by Gal. 3:10-13 and Rom. 7:3, 4.

So that Christ’s
laying down his life might be part of that obedience by which we are justified,
though it was a positive precept not given to Adam. It was doubtless Christ’s
main act of obedience, because it was obedience to a command that was attended
with immensely the greatest difficulty, and so to a command that was the
greatest trial of his obedience. His respect shown to God in it, and his honor
to God’s authority, was proportionably great. It is spoken of in Scripture as
Christ’s principal act of obedience. Phil. 2:7, 8, “But made himself of no
reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the
likeness of men: and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and
became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore God also hath
highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name.” And it
therefore follows from what has been already said, that it is mainly by this act
of obedience that believers in Christ also have the reward of glory, or come to
partake with Christ in his glory. We are as much saved by the death of Christ,
as his yielding himself to die was an act of obedience, as we are as it was a
propitiation for our sins. For as it was not only the only act of obedience that
merited, he having performed meritorious acts of obedience through the whole
course of his life, so neither was it the only suffering that was propitiatory;
all his sufferings through the whole course of his life being propitiatory, as
well as every act of obedience meritorious. Indeed this was his principal
suffering, and it was as much his principal act of obedience.

Hence we may see
how that the death of Christ did not only make atonement, but also merited
eternal life, and hence we may see how by the blood of Christ, we are not only
redeemed from sin, but redeemed unto God. Therefore the Scripture seems
everywhere to attribute the whole of salvation to the blood of Christ. This
precious blood is as much the main price by which heaven is purchased, as it is
the main price by which we are redeemed from hell. The positive righteousness of
Christ, or that price by which he merited, was of equal value with that by which
he satisfied, for indeed it was the same price. He spilled his blood to satisfy,
and by reason of the infinite dignity of his person, his sufferings were looked
upon as of infinite value, and equivalent to the eternal sufferings of a finite
creature. And he spilled his blood out of respect to the honor of God’s
majesty, and in submission to his authority, who had commanded him so to do. His
obedience therein was of infinite value, both because of the dignity of the
person that performed it, and because he put himself to infinite expense to
perform it, whereby the infinite degree of his regard to God’s authority
appeared.

One would wonder
what Arminians mean by Christ’s merits. They talk of Christ’s merits as much
as anybody, and yet deny the imputation of Christ’s positive righteousness.
What should there be than anyone should merit or deserve anything by, besides
righteousness or goodness? If anything that Christ did or suffered, merited or
deserved anything, it was by virtue of the goodness, or righteousness, or
holiness of it. If Christ’s sufferings and death merited heaven, it must be
because there was an excellent righteousness and transcendent moral goodness in
that act of laying down his life. And if by that excellent righteousness he
merited heaven for us, then surely that righteousness is reckoned to our
account, that we have the benefit of it, or, which is the same thing, it is
imputed to us.

Thus, I hope, I
have made it evident, that the righteousness of Christ is indeed imputed to us.

3. I proceed now to
the third and last thing under this argument: That this doctrine, of the
imputation of Christ’s righteousness, is utterly inconsistent with the
doctrine of our being justified by our own virtue or sincere obedience. If
acceptance to God’s favor, and a title to life, be given to believers as the
reward of Christ’s obedience, then it is not given as the reward of our own
obedience. In what respect soever Christ is our Savior, that doubtless excludes
our being our own saviors in that same respect. If we can be our own saviors in
the same respect that Christ is, it will thence follow, that the salvation of
Christ is needless in that respect, according to the apostle’s reasoning, Gal.
5:4, “Christ is rendered of no effect unto you, whosoever of you are justified
by the law.” Doubtless, it is Christ’s prerogative to be our Savior in that
sense wherein he is our Savior. And therefore, if it be by his obedience that we
are justified, then it is not by our own obedience.

Here perhaps it may
be said, that a title to salvation is not directly given as the reward of our
obedience. For that is not by anything of ours, but only by Christ’s
satisfaction and righteousness, but yet an interest in that satisfaction and
righteousness is given as a reward of our obedience.

But this does not
at all help the case. For this is to ascribe as much to our obedience as if we
ascribed salvation to it directly, without the intervention of Christ’s
righteousness. For it would be as great a thing for God to give us Christ, and
his satisfaction and righteousness, in reward for our obedience, as to give us
heaven immediately. It would be as great a reward, and as great a testimony of
respect to our obedience. And if God gives as great a thing as salvation for our
obedience, why could he not as well give salvation itself directly? Then there
would have been no need of Christ’s righteousness. And indeed if God gives us
Christ, or an interest in him, properly in reward for our obedience, he does
really give us salvation in reward for our obedience: for the former implies the
latter. Yea, it implies it, as the greater implies the less. So that indeed it
exalts our virtue and obedience more, to suppose that God gives us Christ in
reward of that virtue and obedience, than if he should give salvation without
Christ.

The thing that the
Scripture guards and militates against, is our imagining that it is our own
goodness, virtue, or excellency, that instates us in God’s acceptance and
favor. But to suppose that God gives us an interest in Christ in reward for our
virtue, is as great an argument that it instates us in God’s favor, as if he
bestowed a title to eternal life as its direct reward. If God gives us an
interest in Christ as a reward of our obedience, it will then follow, that we
are instated in God’s acceptance and favor by our own obedience, antecedent to
our having an interest in Christ. For a rewarding anyone’s excellency,
evermore supposes favor and acceptance on the account of that excellency. It is
the very notion of a reward, that it is a good thing, bestowed in testimony of
respect and favor for the virtue or excellency rewarded. So that it is not by
virtue of our interest in Christ and his merits, that we first come into favor
with God, according to this scheme. For we are in God’s favor before we have
any interest in those merits, in that we have an interest in those merits given
as a fruit of God’s favor for our own virtue. If our interest in Christ be the
fruit of God’s favor, then it cannot be the ground of it. If God did not
accept us, and had no favor for us for our own excellency, he never would bestow
so great a reward upon us, as a right in Christ’s satisfaction, and
righteousness. So that such a scheme destroys itself. For it supposes that
Christ’s satisfaction and righteousness are necessary for us to recommend us
to the favor of God, and yet supposes that we have God’s favor and acceptance
before we have Christ’s satisfaction and righteousness, and have these given
as a fruit of God’s favor.

Indeed, neither
salvation itself, nor Christ the Savior, are given as a reward of anything in
man: They are not given as a reward of faith, nor anything else of ours: We are
not united to Christ as a reward of our faith, but have union with him by faith,
only as faith is the very act of uniting or closing on our part. As when
a man offers himself to a woman in marriage, he does not give himself to her as
a reward of her receiving him in marriage. Her receiving him is not
considered as a worthy deed in her, for which he rewards her by giving himself
to her. But it is by her receiving him that the union is made, by which she has
him for her husband. It is on her part the unition itself. By these
things it appears how contrary to the gospel of Christ their scheme is, who say
that faith justifies as a principle of obedience, or as a leading act of
obedience, or (as others) the sum and comprehension of all evangelical
obedience. For by this, the obedience or virtue that is in faith gives it its
justifying influence, and that is the same thing as to say, that we are
justified by our own obedience, virtue, or goodness.

Having thus considered the evidence of
the truth of the doctrine, I proceed now to the

III. Thing
proposed, viz. “To show in what sense the acts of a Christian life, or
of evangelical obedience, may be looked upon to be concerned in this affair.”

From what has been
said already, it is manifest that they cannot have any concern in this affair as
good works, or by virtue of any moral goodness in them: not as works of the law,
or as that moral excellency, or any part of it, which is the fulfillment of that
great, universal, and everlasting law or covenant of works which the great
lawgiver has established, as the highest and unalterable rule of judgment, which
Christ alone answers, or does anything towards it.

It having been
shown out of the Scripture, that it is only by faith, or the soul’s receiving
and uniting to the Savior who has wrought our righteousness, that we are
justified. It therefore remains, that the acts of a Christian life cannot be
concerned in this affair any otherwise than as they imply, and are the
expressions of faith, and may be looked upon as so many acts of reception of
Christ the Savior. But the determining what concerns acts of Christian obedience
can have in justification in this respect, will depend on the resolving of
another point, viz. whether any other act of faith besides the first act,
has any concern in our justification, or how far perseverance in faith, or the
continued and renewed acts of faith, have influence in this affair. And it seems
manifest that justification is by the first act of faith, in some respects, in a
peculiar manner, because a sinner is actually and finally justified as soon as
he has performed one act of faith, and faith in its first act does, virtually at
least, depend on God for perseverance, and entities to this among other
benefits. But yet the perseverance of faith is not excluded in this affair. It
is not only certainly connected with justification, but it is not to be excluded
from that on which the justification of a sinner has a dependence, or that by
which he is justified.

I have shown that
the way in which justification has a dependence on faith is, that it is the
qualification on which the congruity of an interest in the righteousness of
Christ depends, or wherein such a fitness consists. But the consideration of the
perseverance of faith cannot be excluded out of this congruity or fitness. For
it is congruous that he that believes in Christ should have an interest in
Christ’s righteousness, and so in the eternal benefits purchased by it,
because faith is that by which the soul has union or oneness with Christ. There
is a natural congruity in it, that they who are one with Christ should have a
joint interest with him in his eternal benefits. But yet this congruity depends
on its being an abiding union. As it is needful that the branch should abide in
the vine, in order to its receiving the lasting benefits of the root, so it is
necessary that the soul should abide in Christ, in order to its receiving those
lasting benefits of God’s final acceptance and favor. John 15:6, 7, “If a
man abide not in me, he is cast forth, as a branch. If ye abide in me, and my
words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you.”
John 15:9, 10, “Continue ye in my love. If ye keep (or abide in) my
commandments, ye shall abide in my love: even as I have kept my Father’s
commandments, and abide in his love.” There is the same reason why it is
necessary that the union with Christ should remain, as why it should be begun:
why it should continue to be, as why it should once be. If it should be begun
without remaining, the beginning would be in vain. In order to the soul’s
being now in a justified state, and now free from condemnation, it is necessary
that it should now be in Christ, and not merely that it should once have been in
him. Rom. 8:1, “There is no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus.”
The soul is saved in Christ, as being now in him, when the salvation is
bestowed, and not merely as remembering that it once was in him. Phil. 3:9,
“That I may be found in him, not having mine own righteousness, which is of
the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which
is of God by faith.” 1 John 2:28, “And now, little children, abide in him;
that when he shall appear, we may have confidence, and not be ashamed before him
at his coming.” In order for people to be blessed after death, it is necessary
not only that they should once be in him, but that they should die in him. Rev.
14:13, “Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord.” And there is the same
reason why faith, the uniting qualification, should remain in order to the
union’s remaining, as why it should once be, in order to the union’s once
being.

So that although
the sinner is actually and finally justified on the first act of faith, yet the
perseverance of faith, even then, comes into consideration, as one thing on
which the fitness of acceptance to life depends. God in the act of
justification, which is passed on a sinner’s first believing, has respect to
perseverance, as being virtually contained in that first act of faith, and it is
looked upon, and taken by him that justifies, as being as it were a property in
that faith. God has respect to the believer’s continuance in faith, and he is
justified by that, as though it already were, because by divine establishment it
shall follow, and it being by divine constitution connected with that first
faith, as much as if it were a property in it, it is then considered as such,
and so justification is not suspended. But were it not for this, it would be
needful that it should be suspended, till the sinner had actually persevered in
faith.

And that it is so,
that God in the act of final justification which he passes at the sinner’s
conversion, has respect to perseverance in faith, and future acts of faith, as
being virtually implied in the first act, is further manifest by this, viz.
That in a sinner’s justification, at his conversion there is virtually
contained a forgiveness as to eternal and deserved punishment, not only of all
past sins, but also of all future infirmities and acts of sin that they shall be
guilty of, because that first justification is decisive and final. And yet
pardon, in the order of nature, properly follows the crime, and also follows
those acts of repentance and faith that respect the crime pardoned, as is
manifest both from reason and Scripture. David, in the beginning of Psalm 32
speaks of the forgiveness of sins which were doubtless committed long after he
was first godly, as being consequent on those sins, and on his repentance and
faith with respect to them, and yet this forgiveness is spoken of by the apostle
in the 4th of Romans, as an instance of justification by faith. Probably the sin
David there speaks of is the same that he committed in the matter of Uriah, and
so the pardon the same with that release from death or eternal punishment, which
the prophet Nathan speaks of, 2 Sam. 12:13, “The Lord also hath put away thy
sin; thou shalt not die.” Not only does the manifestation of this pardon
follow the sin in the order of time, but the pardon itself, in the order of
nature, follows David’s repentance and faith with respect to this sin. For it
is spoken of in Psalm 32 as depending on it.

But inasmuch as a
sinner, in his first justification, is forever justified and freed from all
obligation to eternal punishment, it hence of necessity follows, that future
faith and repentance are beheld, in that justification, as virtually contained
in that first faith and repentance. Because repentance of those future sins, and
faith in a Redeemer, with respect to them, or at least, the continuance of that
habit and principle in the heart that has such an actual repentance and faith in
its nature and tendency, is now made sure by God’s promise. — If remission
of sins committed after conversion, in the order of nature, follows that faith
and repentance that is after them, then it follows that future sins are
respected in the first justification, no otherwise than as future faith and
repentance are respected in it. And future repentance and faith are looked upon
by him that justifies, as virtually implied in the first repentance and faith,
in the same manner as justification from future sins is virtually implied in the
first justification, which is the thing that was to be proved.

And besides, if no
other act of faith could be concerned in justification but the first act, it
will then follow that Christians ought never to seek justification by any other
act of faith. For if justification is not to be obtained by after acts of faith,
then surely it is not a duty to seek it by such acts. And so it can never be a
duty for persons after they are once converted, by faith to seek God, or
believingly to look to him for the remission of sin, or deliverance from the
guilt of it, because deliverance from the guilt of sin, is part of what belongs
to justification. And if it be not proper for converts by faith to look to God
through Christ for it, then it will follow that it is not proper for them to
pray for it. For Christian prayer to God for a blessing, is but an expression of
faith in God for that blessing: prayer is only the voice of faith. But if these
things are so, it will follow that the petition in the Lord’s prayer, forgive
us our debts, is not proper to be put up by the disciples of Christ, or to
be used in Christian assemblies, and that Christ improperly directed his
disciples to use that petition, when they were all of them, except Judas,
converted before. The debt that Christ directs his disciples to pray for the
forgiveness of, can mean nothing else but the punishment that sin deserves, or
the debt that we owe to divine justice, the ten thousand talents we owe our
Lord. To pray that God would forgive our debts, is undoubtedly the same thing as
to pray that God would release us from obligation to due punishment. But
releasing from obligation to the punishment due to sin, and forgiving the debt
that we owe to divine justice, is what appertains to justification.

Then to
suppose that no after acts of faith are concerned in the business of
justification, and so that it is not proper for any ever to seek justification
by such acts, would be forever to cut off those Christians that are doubtful
concerning their first act of faith, from the joy and peace of believing. As the
business of a justifying faith is to obtain pardon and peace with God by looking
to God, and trusting in him for these blessings, so the joy and peace of that
faith is in the apprehension of pardon and peace obtained by such a trust. This
a Christian that is doubtful of his first act of faith cannot have from that
act, because, by the supposition, he is doubtful whether it be an act of faith,
and so whether be did obtain pardon and peace by that act. The proper remedy, in
such a case, is now by faith to look to God in Christ for these blessings, but
he is cut off from this remedy, because he is uncertain whether he his warrant
so to do. For he does not know but that he has believed already, and if so, then
he has no warrant to look to God by faith for these blessings now, because, by
the supposition, no new act of faith is a proper means of obtaining these
blessings. So he can never properly obtain the joy of faith, for there are acts
of true faith that are very weak, and the first act may be so as well as others.
It may be like the first motion of the infant in the womb: it may be so weak an
act, that the Christian, by examining it, may never be able to determine whether
it was a true act of faith or no. It is evident from fact, and abundant
experience, that many Christians are forever at a loss to determine which was
their first act of faith. And those saints who have had a good degree of
satisfaction concerning their faith, may be subject to great declensions and
falls, in which case they are liable to great fears of eternal punishment. The
proper way of deliverance, is to forsake their sin by repentance, and by faith
now to come to Christ for deliverance from the deserved eternal punishment. But
this it would not be, if deliverance from that punishment was not this way to be
obtained.

But what is a still
more plain and direct evidence of what I am now arguing for, is that the act of
faith which Abraham exercised in the great promise of the covenant of grace that
God made to him, of which it is expressly said, Gal. 3:6, “It was accounted to
him for righteousness” — the grand instance and proof that the apostle so
much insists upon throughout Romans 4, and Galatians 3, to confirm his doctrine
of justification by faith alone — was not Abraham’s first act of faith, but
was exerted long after he had by faith forsaken his own country, Heb. 11:8, and
had been treated as an eminent friend of God.

Moreover, the
apostle Paul, in Philippians 3, tells us how earnestly he sought justification
by faith, or to win Christ and obtain that righteousness which was by the faith
of him, in what he did after his conversion. Phil. 3:8, 9, “For whom I have
suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win
Christ, and be found in him, not having mine own righteousness which is of the
law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is
of God by faith.” And in the two next verses he expresses the same thing in
other words, and tells us how he went through sufferings, and became conformable
to Christ’s death, that he might be a partaker with Christ in the benefit of
his resurrection, which the same apostle elsewhere teaches us, is especially
justification. Christ’s resurrection was his justification. In this, he that
was put to death in the flesh, was justified by the Spirit, and he that was
delivered for our offenses, rose again for our justification. And the apostle
tells us in the verses that follow in that third chapter of Philippians, that he
thus sought to attain the righteousness which is through the faith of Christ,
and so to partake of the benefit of his resurrection, still as though he had not
already attained, but that he continued to follow after it.

On the whole, it
appears that the perseverance of faith is necessary, even to the congruity of
justification, and that not the less, because a sinner is justified, and
perseverance promised, on the first act of faith. But God, in that
justification, has respect, not only to the past act of faith, but to his own
promise of future acts, and to the fitness of a qualification beheld as yet only
in his own promise. And that perseverance in faith is thus necessary to
salvation, not merely as a sine qua non, or as a universal concomitant of
it, but by reason of such an influence and dependence, seems manifest by many
Scriptures, I would mention two or three — Heb. 3:6, “Whose house are we, if
we hold fast the confidence, and the rejoicing of the hope firm unto the end.”
Verse 14, “For we are made partakers of Christ, if we hold the beginning of
our confidence stedfast unto the end.” Heb. 6:12, “Be ye followers of them,
who through faith and patience inherit the promises.” Rom. 11:20, “Well,
because of unbelief they were broken off; but thou standest by faith. Be not
high-minded, but fear.”

And, as the
congruity to a final justification depends on perseverance in faith, as well as
the first act, so oftentimes the manifestation of justification in the
conscience, arises a great deal more from after acts, than the first act. All
the difference whereby the first act of faith has a concern in this affair that
is peculiar, seems to be, as it were, only an accidental difference, arising
from the circumstance of time, or its being first in order of time, and not from
any peculiar respect that God has to it, or any influence it has of a peculiar
nature, in the affair of our salvation.

And thus it is that
a truly Christian walk, and the acts of an evangelical, child-like, believing
obedience, are concerned in the affair of our justification, and seem to be
sometimes so spoken of in Scripture, viz. as an expression of a
persevering faith in the Son of God, the only Savior. Faith unites to Christ,
and so gives a congruity to justification, not merely as remaining a dormant
principle in the heart, but as being and appearing in its active expressions.
The obedience of a Christian, so far as it is truly evangelical, and performed
with the Spirit of the Son sent forth into the heart, has all relation to Christ
the Mediator, and is but an expression of the soul’s believing unition to
Christ. All evangelical works are works of that faith that worketh by love, and
every such act of obedience, wherein it is inward, and the act of the soul, is
only a new effective act of reception of Christ, and adherence to the glorious
Savior. Hence that of the apostle, Gal. 2:20, “I live; yet not I, but Christ
liveth in me; and the life that I now live in the flesh, is by the faith of the
Son of God.” And hence we are directed, in whatever we do, whether in word or
deed, to do all in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, Col. 3:17.

And that God in
justification has respect, not only to the first act of faith, but also to
future persevering acts, as expressed in life, seems manifest by Rom. 1:17,
“For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it
is written, The just shall live by faith.” And Heb. 10:38, 39, “Now the just
shall live by faith; but if any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in
him. But we are not of them who draw back unto perdition, but of them that
believe, to the saving of the soul.”

So that, as was
before said of faith, so may it be said of a child-like believing obedience: it
has no concern in justification by any virtue or excellency in it, but only as
there is a reception of Christ in it. And this is no more contrary to the
apostle’s frequent assertion of our being justified without the works of the
law, than to say that we are justified by faith. For faith is as much a work, or
act of Christian obedience, as the expressions of faith, in spiritual life and
walk. And therefore, as we say that faith does not justify as a work, so we say
of all these effective expressions of faith.

This is the reverse
of the scheme of our modem divines, who hold that faith justifies only as an act
or expression of obedience. Whereas, in truth, obedience has no concern in
justification, any otherwise than as an expression of faith.

I now proceed to
the

IV. Thing proposed,
viz. To answer objections.

Object.
1. We frequently find promises of eternal life and salvation, and sometimes of
justification itself, made to our own virtue and obedience. Eternal life is
promised to obedience, in Rom. 2:7, “To them who by patient continuance in
well doing seek for glory, honor, and immortality, eternal life:” And the like
in innumerable other places. And justification itself is promised to that virtue
of a forgiving spirit or temper in us, Mat. 6:14, “For, if ye forgive men
their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you: but if you forgive
not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.”
All allow that justification in great part consists in the forgiveness of sins.

To this I answer,

1. These things
being promised to our virtue and obedience, argues no more, than that there is a
connection between them and evangelical obedience, which, I have already
observed, is not the thing in dispute. All that can be proved by obedience and
salvation being connected in the promise, is that obedience and salvation are
connected in fact, which nobody denies, and whether it be owned or denied, is,
as has been shown, nothing to the purpose. There is no need that an admission to
a title to salvation should be given on the account of our obedience, in order
to the promises being true. If we find such a promise, that he that obeys shall
be saved, or he that is holy shall be justified, all that is needful, in order
to such promises being true, is that it be really so: that he that obeys shall
be saved, and that holiness and justification shall indeed go together. That
proposition may be a truth, that he that obeys shall be saved, because obedience
and salvation are connected together in fact, and yet an acceptance to a title
to salvation not be granted upon the account of any of our own virtue or
obedience. What is a promise, but only a declaration of future truth, for the
comfort and encouragement of the person to whom it is declared? Promises are
conditional propositions, and, as has been already observed, it is not the thing
in dispute, whether other things besides faith may not have the place of the
condition in such propositions wherein pardon and salvation are the consequent.

2. Promises may
rationally be made to signs and evidences of faith, and yet the thing promised
not be upon the account of the sign, but the thing signified. Thus, for
instance, human government may rationally make promises of such and such
privileges to those that can show such evidences of their being free of such a
city, or members of such a corporation, or descended of such a family, when it
is not at all for the sake of that which is the evidence or sign, in itself
considered, that they are admitted to such a privilege, but only and purely for
the sake of that which it is an evidence of. And though God does not stand in
need of signs to know whether we have true faith or not, yet our own consciences
do, so that it is much for our comfort that promises are made to signs of faith.
Finding in ourselves a forgiving temper and disposition, may be a most proper
and natural evidence to our consciences, that our hearts have, in a sense of our
own utter unworthiness, truly closed and fallen in with the way of free and
infinitely gracious forgiveness of our sins by Jesus Christ, whence we may be
enabled, with the greater comfort, to apply to ourselves the promises of
forgiveness by Christ.

3. It has been just
now shown, how that acts of evangelical obedience are indeed concerned in our
justification itself, and are not excluded from that condition that
justification depends upon, without the least prejudice to that doctrine of
justification by faith, without any goodness of our own, that has been
maintained. Therefore it can be no objection against this doctrine, that we have
sometimes in Scripture promises of pardon and acceptance made to such acts of
obedience.

4. Promises of
particular benefits implied in justification and salvation, may especially be
fitly made to such expressions and evidences of faith as they have a peculiar
natural likeness and suitableness to. As forgiveness is promised to a forgiving
spirit in us, obtaining mercy is fitly promised to mercifulness in us, and the
like, and that upon several accounts, they are the most natural evidences of our
heart’s closing with those benefits by faith. For they do especially show the
sweet accord and consent that there is between the heart and these benefits, and
by reason of the natural likeness that there is between the virtue and the
benefit, the one has the greater tendency to bring the other to mind. The
practice of the virtue tends the more to renew the sense, and refresh the hope
of the blessing promised, and also to convince the conscience of the justice of
being denied the benefit, if the duty be neglected. Besides the sense and
manifestation of divine forgiveness in our own consciences — yea, and many
exercises of God’s forgiving mercy (as it respects God’s fatherly
displeasure), granted after justification, through the course of a Christian’s
life — may be given as the proper rewards of a forgiving spirit, and yet this
not be at all to the prejudice of the doctrine we have maintained, as will more
fully appear, when we come to answer another objection hereafter to be
mentioned.

Object. 2.
Our own obedience, and inherent holiness, is necessary to prepare men for
heaven, and therefore is doubtless what recommends persons to God’s
acceptance, as the heirs of heaven.

To this I answer,

1. Our own
obedience being necessary, in order to a preparation for an actual bestowment of
glory, is no argument that it is the thing upon the account of which we are
accepted to a right to it. God may, and does do many things to prepare the
saints for glory, after he has accepted them as the heirs of glory. A parent may
do much to prepare a child for an inheritance in its education, after the child
is an heir. Yea, there are many things necessary to fit a child for the actual
possession of the inheritance, yet not necessary in order to its having a right
to the inheritance.

2. If everything
that is necessary to prepare men for glory must be the proper condition of
justification, then perfect holiness is the condition of justification. Men must
be made perfectly holy, before they are admitted to the enjoyment of the
blessedness of heaven, for there must in no wise enter in there any spiritual
defilement. And therefore, when a saint dies, he leaves all his sin and
corruption when he leaves the body.

Object.
3. Our obedience is not only indissolubly connected with salvation, and
preparatory to it, but the Scripture expressly speaks of bestowing eternal
blessings as rewards for the good deeds of the saints. Mat. 10:42, “Whosoever
shall give to drink unto one of these little ones a cup of cold water only, in
the name of a disciple, he shall in no wise lose his reward.” 1 Cor 3:8,
“Every man shall receive his own reward, according to his own labor.” And in
many other places. This seems to militate against the doctrine that has been
maintained, two ways: (1.) The bestowing a reward, carries in it a respect to a
moral fitness in the thing rewarded to the reward. The very notion of a reward
being a benefit bestowed in testimony of acceptance of, and respect to, the
goodness or amiableness of some qualification or work in the person rewarded.
Besides, the Scripture seems to explain itself in this matter, in Rev. 3:4,
“Thou hast a few names, even in Sardis, which have not defiled their garments;
and they shall walk with me in white; for they are worthy.” This is here given
as the reason why they should have such a reward, “because they were
worthy;” which, though we suppose it to imply no proper merit, yet it at least
implies a moral fitness, or that the excellency of their virtue in God’s sight
recommends them to such a reward, which seems directly repugnant to what has
been supposed, viz. that we are accepted, and approved of God, as the
heirs of salvation, not out of regard to the excellency of our own virtue or
goodness, or any moral fitness therein to such a reward, but only on account of
the dignity and moral fitness of Christ’s righteousness. (2.) Our being
eternally rewarded for our own holiness and good works, necessarily supposes
that our future happiness will be greater or smaller, in some proportion as our
own holiness and obedience is more or less, and that there are different degrees
of glory, according to different degrees of virtue and good works, is a doctrine
very expressly and frequently taught us in Scripture. But this seems quite
inconsistent with the saints all having their future blessedness as a reward of
Christ’s righteousness. For if Christ’s righteousness be imputed to all, and
this be what entitles each one to glory, then it is the same righteousness that
entitles one to glory which entitles another. But if all have glory as the
reward of the same righteousness, why have not all the same glory? Does not the
same righteousness merit as much glory when imputed to one as when imputed to
another?

In answer to the first
part of this objection, I would observe, that it does not argue that we are
justified by our good deeds, that we shall have eternal blessings in reward for
them. For it is in consequence of our justification, that our good deeds become
rewardable with spiritual and eternal rewards. The acceptableness, and so the
rewardableness, of our virtue, is not antecedent to justification, but follows
it, and is built entirely upon it, which is the reverse of what those in the
adverse scheme of justification suppose, viz. that justification is built
on the acceptableness and rewardableness of our virtue. They suppose that a
saving interest in Christ is given as a reward of our virtue, or (which is the
same thing), as a testimony of God’s acceptance of our excellency in our
virtue. But the contrary is true: that God’s respect to our virtue as our
amiableness in his sight, and his acceptance of it as rewardable, is entirely
built on our interest in Christ already established. So that the relation to
Christ, whereby believers in scripture language are said to be in Christ, is the
very foundation of our virtues and good deeds being accepted of God, and so
their being rewarded. For a reward is a testimony of acceptance. For we, and all
that we do, are accepted only in the beloved, Eph. 1:6. Our sacrifices are
acceptable, only through our interest in him, and through his worthiness and
preciousness being, as it were, made ours. 1 Pet. 2:4, 5, “To whom coming, as
unto a living stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God, and precious.
Ye also as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood to
offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.” Here being
actually built on this stone, precious to God, is mentioned as all the ground of
the acceptableness of our good works to God, and their becoming also precious in
his eyes. So, Heb. 13:21, “Make you perfect in every good work to do his will,
working in you that which is well pleasing in his sight, through Jesus
Christ.” And hence we are directed, whatever we offer to God, to offer it in
Christ’s name, as expecting to have it accepted no other way, than from the
value that God has to that name. Col. 3:17, “And whatsoever ye do in word or
deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father
by him.” To act in Christ’s name, is to act under him as our head, and as
having him to stand for us, and represent us to God-ward.

The reason of this
may be seen from what has been already said, to show it is not meet that
anything in us should be accepted of God as any excellency of our persons, until
we are actually in Christ, and justified through him. The loveliness of the
virtue of fallen creatures is nothing in the sight of God, till he beholds them
in Christ, and clothed with his righteousness. 1. Because till then we stand
condemned before God, by his own holy law, to his utter rejection and
abhorrence. And, 2. Because we are infinitely guilty before him, and the
loveliness of our virtue bears no proportion to our guilt, and must therefore
pass for nothing before a strict judge. And, 3. Because our good deeds and
virtuous acts themselves are in a sense corrupt, and the hatefulness of the
corruption of them, if we are beheld as we are in ourselves, or separate from
Christ, infinitely outweighs the loveliness of the good that is in them. So that
if no other sin was considered but only that which attends the act of virtue
itself, the loveliness vanishes into nothing in comparison of it, and therefore
the virtue must pass for nothing, out of Christ. Not only are our best duties
defiled, in being attended with the exercises of sin and corruption which
precede, follow, and are intermingled with them, but even the holy acts
themselves, and the gracious exercises of the godly, are defective. Though the
act most simply considered is good, yet take the acts in their measure and
dimensions, and the manner in which they are exerted, and they are sinfully
defective: there is that defect in them that may well be called the corruption
of them. That defect is properly sin, an expression of a vile sinfulness of
heart and what tends to provoke the just anger of God, not because the exercises
of love and other grace is not equal to God’s loveliness. For it is impossible
the love of creatures (men or angels) should be so, but because the act is so
very disproportionate to the occasion given for love or other grace, considering
God’s loveliness, the manifestation that is made of it, the exercises of
kindness, the capacity of human nature, and our advantages (and the like)
together. — A negative expression of corruption may be as truly sin, and as
just cause of provocation, as a positive. Thus if a worthy and excellent person
should, from mere generosity and goodness, exceedingly lay out himself, and with
great expense and suffering save another’s life, or redeem him from some
extreme calamity, and if that other person should never thank him for it, or
express the least gratitude any way, this would be a negative expression of his
ingratitude and baseness. But [it] is equivalent to an act of ingratitude, or
positive exercise of a base unworthy spirit, and is truly an expression of it,
and brings as much blame as if he by some positive act had much injured another
person. And so it would be (only in a lesser degree) if the gratitude was but
very small, bearing no proportion to the benefit obligation. As if, for so great
and extraordinary a kindness, he should express no more gratitude than would
have been becoming towards a person who had only given him a cup of water when
thirsty, or shown him the way in a journey when at a loss, or had done him some
such small kindness. If he should come to his benefactor to express his
gratitude, and should do after this manner, he might truly be said to act
unworthily and odiously, he would show a most ungrateful spirit. His doing after
such a manner might justly be abhorred by all, and yet the gratitude, that
little there is of it, most simply considered, and so far as it goes, is good.
And so it is with respect to our exercise of love, and gratitude, and other
graces, towards God. They are defectively corrupt and sinful, and take them as
they are, in their manner and measure, might justly be odious and provoking to
God, and would necessarily be so, were we beheld out of Christ. For in that this
defect is sin, it is infinitely hateful, and so the hatefulness of the very act
infinitely outweighs the loveliness of it, because all sin has infinite
hatefulness and heinousness. But our holiness has but little value and
loveliness, as has been elsewhere demonstrated.

Hence, though it be
true that the saints are rewarded for their good works, yet it is for Christ’s
sake only, and not for the excellency of their works in themselves considered,
or beheld separately from Christ. For so they have no excellency in God’s
sight, or acceptableness to him, as has now been shown. It is acknowledged that
God, in rewarding the holiness and good works of believers, does in some respect
give them happiness as a testimony of his respect to the loveliness of their
holiness and good works in his sight. For that is the very notion of a reward.
But it is in a very different sense from what would have been if man had not
fallen, which would have been to bestow eternal life on man, as a testimony of
God’s respect to the loveliness of what man did, considered as in itself, and
as in man separately by himself, and not beheld as a member of Christ. In which
sense also, the scheme of justification we are opposing necessarily supposes the
excellency of our virtue to be respected and rewarded. For it supposes a saving
interest in Christ itself to be given as a reward of it.

Two things come to
pass, relating to the saints’ reward for their inherent righteousness, by
virtue of their relation to Christ. 1. The guilt of their persons is all done
away, and the pollution and hatefulness that attends and is in their good works,
is hid. 2. Their relation to Christ adds a positive value and dignity to their
good works in God’s sight. That little holiness, and those faint and feeble
acts of love, and other grace, receive and exceeding value in the sight of God,
by virtue of God’s beholding them as in Christ, and as it were members of one
so infinitely worthy in his eyes, and that because God looks upon the persons as
of greater dignity on this account. Isa. 43:4, “Since thou wast precious in my
sight, thou has been honorable.” God, for Christ’s sake, and because they
are members of his own righteous and dear Son, sets an exceeding value upon
their persons. Hence it follows, that he also sets a great value upon their good
acts and offerings. The same love and obedience in a person of greater dignity
and value in God’s sight, is more valuable in his eyes than in one of less
dignity. Love is valuable in proportion to the dignity of the person whose love
it is, because so far as anyone gives his love to another, he gives himself, in
that he gives his heart. But this is a more excellent offering, in proportion as
the person whose self is offered is more worthy. Believers are become immensely
more honorable in God’s esteem by virtue of their relation to Christ, than man
would have been considered as by himself, though he had been free from sin: as a
mean person becomes more honorable when married to a king. Hence God will
probably reward the little weak love, and poor and exceeding imperfect obedience
of believers in Christ, with more glorious reward than he would have done
Adam’s perfect obedience. According to the tenor of the first covenant, the
person was to be accepted and rewarded, only for the work’s sake. But by the
covenant of grace, the work is accepted and rewarded, only for the person’s
sake: the person being beheld antecedently as a member of Christ, and clothed
with his righteousness. So that though the saints’ inherent holiness is
rewarded, yet this very reward is indeed not the less founded on the worthiness
and righteousness of Christ. None of the value that their works have in his
sight, nor any of the acceptance they have with him, is out of Christ, and out
of his righteousness. But his worthiness as mediator is the prime and only
foundation on which all is built, and the universal source whence all arises.
God indeed does great things out of regard to the saints’ loveliness, but it
is only as a secondary and derivative loveliness. When I speak of a derivative
loveliness, I do not mean only, that the qualifications themselves accepted as
lovely, are derived from Christ, from his power and purchase, but that the
acceptance of them as a loveliness, and all the value that is set upon them, and
all their connection with the reward, is founded in, and derived from,
Christ’s righteousness and worthiness.

If we suppose that
not only higher degrees of glory in heaven, but heaven itself, is in some
respect given in reward for the holiness and good works of the saints, in this
secondary and derivative sense, it will not prejudice the doctrine we have
maintained. It is no way impossible that God may bestow heavens’ glory wholly
out of respect to Christ’s righteousness, and yet in reward for man’s
inherent holiness, in different respects, and different ways. It may be only
Christ’s righteousness that God has respect to, for its own sake, the
independent acceptableness and dignity of it being sufficient of itself to
recommend all that believe in Christ to a title to this glory. So it may be only
by this that persons enter into a title to heaven, or have their prime right to
it. Yet God may also have respect to the saints’ own holiness, for Christ’s
sake, and as deriving a value from Christ’s merit, which he may testify in
bestowing heaven upon them. The saints being beheld as members of Christ, their
obedience is looked upon by God as something of Christ’s: it being the
obedience of the members of Christ, as the sufferings of the members of Christ
are looked upon, in some respect, as the sufferings of Christ. Hence the
apostle, speaking of his sufferings, says, Col. 1:24, “Who now rejoice in my
sufferings for you, and fill up that which is behind of the afflictions of
Christ in my flesh.” To the same purpose is Mat. 25:35, etc. I was hungry,
naked, sick, and in prison, etc. And so that in Rev. 11:8 “And their dead
bodies shall lie in the street of the great city, which spiritually is called
Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified.”

By the merit and
righteousness of Christ, such favor of God towards the believer may be obtained,
as that God may hereby be already, as it were, disposed to make them perfectly
and eternally happy. But yet this does not hinder, but that God in his wisdom
may choose to bestow this perfect and eternal happiness in this way, viz.
in some respect as a reward of their holiness and obedience. It is not
impossible but that the blessedness may be bestowed as a reward for that which
is done after that an interest is already obtained in that favor, which (to
speak of God after the manner of men) disposes God to bestow the blessedness.
Our heavenly Father may already have that favor for a child, whereby he may be
thoroughly ready to give the child an inheritance, because he is his child,
which he is by the purchase of Christ’s righteousness, and yet that the Father
may choose to bestow the inheritance on the child in a way of reward for his
dutifulness, and behaving in a manner becoming a child. And so great a reward
may not be judged more than a meet reward for his dutifulness, but that so great
a reward is judged meet, does not arise from the excellency of the obedience
absolutely considered, but from his standing in so near and honorable a relation
to God, as that of a child, which is obtained only by the righteousness of
Christ. And thus the reward, and the greatness of it, arises properly from the
righteousness of Christ, though it be indeed in some sort the reward of their
obedience. As a father might justly esteem the inheritance no more than a meet
reward for the obedience of his child, and yet esteem it more than a meet reward
for the obedience of a servant. The favor whence a believer’s heavenly Father
bestows the eternal inheritance, and his title as an heir, is founded in that
relation he stands in to him as a child, purchased by Christ’s righteousness:
though he in wisdom chooses to bestow it in such a way, and therein to testify
his acceptance of the amiableness of his obedience in Christ.

Believers having a
title to heaven by faith antecedent to their obedience, or its being absolutely
promised to them before, does not hinder but that the actual bestowment of
heaven may also be a testimony of God’s regard to their obedience, though
performed afterwards. Thus it was with Abraham, the father and pattern of all
believers. God bestowed upon him that blessing of multiplying his seed as the
stars of heaven, and causing that in his seed all the families of the earth
should be blessed, in reward for his obedience in offering up his son Isaac,
Gen. 22:16, 17, 18, “And said, By myself have I sworn, saith the Lord, for
because thou hast done this thing, and hast not withheld thy son, thine only
son; that in blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying I will multiply thy
seed as the stars of heaven, and as the sand which is upon the sea shore; and
they seed shall possess the gate of his enemies; and in thy seed shall all the
nations of the earth be blessed; because thou hast obeyed my voice.” And yet
the very same blessings had been from time to time promised to Abraham, in the
most positive terms, and the promise, with great solemnity, confirmed and sealed
to him, as Gen. 12:2, 3; chap. 13:16; chap. 15:1, 4-7, etc. Gen. 17 throughout;
chap. 18:10, 18.

From what has been
said we may easily solve the difficulty arising from that text in Rev. 3:4,
“They shall walk with me in white, for they are worthy;” which is parallel
with that text in Luke 20:35, “But they which shall be accounted worthy to
obtain that world, and the resurrection from the dead.” I allow (as in the
objection) that this worthiness does doubtless denote a moral fitness to the
reward, or that God looks on these glorious benefits as a meet testimony of his
regard to the value which their persons and performances have in his sight.

1. God looks on
these glorious benefits as a meet testimony of his regard to the value which
their persons have in his sight. But he sets this value upon their persons
purely for Christ’s sake. They are such jewels, and have such preciousness in
his eyes, only because they are beheld in Christ, and by reason of the
worthiness of the head they are the members of, and the stock they are grafted
into. And the value that God sets upon them on this account is so great, that
God thinks meet, from regard to it, to admit them to such exceeding glory. The
saints, on account of their relation to Christ, are such precious jewels in
God’s sight, that they are thought worthy of a place in his own crown. Mal.
3:17; Zec. 9:16. So far as the saints are said to be valuable in God’s sight,
on whatever account, so far may they properly be said to be worthy, or meet for
that honor which is answerable to the value or price which God sets upon them. A
child or wife of a prince is worthy to be treated with great honor. Therefore if
a mean person should be adopted to be a child of a prince, or should be espoused
to a prince, it would be proper to say, that she was worthy of such and such
honor and respect. There would be no force upon the words in saying that she
ought to have such respect paid her, for she is worthy, though it be only on
account of her relation to the prince that she is so.

2. From the value
God sets upon their persons, for the sake of Christ’s worthiness, he also sets
a high value on their virtue and performances. Their meek and quiet spirit is of
great price in his sight. Their fruits are pleasant fruits, their offerings are
an odor of sweet smell to him, and that because of the value he sets on their
persons, as has been already observed and explained. This preciousness or high
valuableness of believers is a moral fitness to a reward. Yet this valuableness
is all in the righteousness of Christ, that is the foundation of it. The thing
respected is not excellency in them separately by themselves, or in their virtue
by itself, but the value in God’s account arises from other considerations,
which is the natural import of Luke 20:35, “They which shall be accounted
worthy to obtain that world,” etc. and Luke 21:36, “That ye may be accounted
worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before
the Son of man.” 2 Thes. 1:5, “That ye may be counted worthy of the kingdom
of God, for which ye also suffer.”

There is a vast
difference between this scheme, and what is supposed in the scheme of those that
oppose the doctrine of justification by faith alone. This lays the foundation of
first acceptance with God, and all actual salvation consequent upon it, wholly
in Christ and his righteousness. On the contrary, in their scheme, a regard to
man’s own excellency or virtue is supposed to be first, and to have the place
of the first foundation in actual salvation, though not in that ineffectual
redemption, which they suppose common to all. They lay the foundation of all
discriminating salvation in man’s own virtue and moral excellency. This is the
very bottom stone in this affair, for they suppose that it is from regard to our
virtue, that even a special interest in Christ itself is given. The foundation
being thus contrary, the whole scheme becomes exceeding diverse and contrary.
The one is an evangelical scheme, the other a legal one. The one is utterly
inconsistent with our being justified by Christ’s righteousness, the other not
at all.

From what has been
said, we may understand, not only how the forgiveness of sin granted in
justification is indissolubly connected with a forgiving spirit in us, but how
there may be many exercises of forgiving mercy granted in reward for our
forgiving those who trespass against us. For none will deny but that there are
many acts of divine forgiveness towards the saints, that do not presuppose an
unjustified state immediately preceding that forgiveness. None will deny, that
saints who never fell from a justified state, yet commit many sins which God
forgives afterwards, by laying aside his fatherly displeasure. This forgiveness
may be in reward for our forgiveness, without any prejudice to the doctrine that
has been maintained, as well as other mercies and blessings consequent on
justification.

With respect to the
second part of the objection, that relates to the different degrees of
glory, and the seeming inconsistency there is in it, that the degrees of glory
in different saints should be greater or lesser according to their inherent
holiness and good works, and yet, that everyone’s glory should be purchased
with the price of the very same imputed righteousness, — I answer that Christ,
by his righteousness, purchased for everyone complete and perfect happiness,
according to his capacity. But this does not hinder but that the saints, being
of various capacities, may have various degrees of happiness, and yet all their
happiness be the fruit of Christ’s purchase. Indeed it cannot be properly
said, that Christ purchased any particular degree of happiness, so that the
value of Christ’s righteousness in the sight of God, is sufficient to raise a
believer so high in happiness, and no higher, and so that if the believer were
made happier, it would exceed the value of Christ’s righteousness. But in
general, Christ purchased eternal life, or perfect happiness for all, according
to their several capacities. The saints are as so many vessels of different
sizes, cast into a sea of happiness, where every vessel is full: this Christ
purchased for all. But after all, it is left to God’s sovereign pleasure to
determine the largeness of the vessel. Christ’s righteousness meddles not with
this matter. Eph 4:4, 5, 6, 7, “There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye
are called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism,”
etc. — “But unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of
the gift of Christ.” God may dispense in this matter according to what rule he
pleases, not the less for what Christ has done: he may dispense either without
condition, or upon what condition he pleases to fix. It is evident that
Christ’s righteousness meddles not with this matter, for what Christ did was
to fulfill the covenant of works, but the covenant of works did not meddle at
all with this. If Adam had persevered in perfect obedience, he and his posterity
would have had perfect and full happiness. Everyone’s happiness would have so
answered his capacity, that he would have been completely blessed. But God would
have been at liberty to have made some of one capacity, and other of another, as
he pleased. — The angels have obtained eternal life, or a state of confirmed
glory, by a covenant of works, whose condition was perfect obedience. But yet
some are higher in glory than others, according to the several capacities that
God, according to his sovereign pleasure, has given them. So that it being still
left with God, notwithstanding the perfect obedience of the second Adam, to fix
the degree of each one’s capacity by what rule he pleases, he has been pleased
to fix the degree of capacity, and so of glory, by the proportion of the
saints’ grace and fruitfulness here. He gives higher degrees of glory, in
reward for higher degrees of holiness and good works, because it pleases him,
and yet all the happiness of each saint is indeed the fruit of the purchase of
Christ’s obedience. If it had been but one man that Christ had obeyed and died
for, and it had pleased God to make him a very large capacity, Christ’s
perfect obedience would have purchased that his capacity should be filled, and
then all his happiness might properly be said to be the fruit of Christ’s
perfect obedience. Though, if he had been of a less capacity, he would not have
had so much happiness by the same obedience, and yet would have had as much as
Christ merited for him. Christ’s righteousness meddles not with the degree of
happiness, any otherwise than as he merits that it should be full and perfect,
according to the capacity. So it may be said to be concerned in the degree of
happiness, as perfect is a degree with respect to imperfect, but it meddles not
with degrees of perfect happiness.

This matter may be
yet better understood, if we consider that Christ and the whole church of saints
are, as it were, one body, of which he is the Head, and they members, of
different place and capacity. Now the whole body, head, and members, have
communion in Christ’s righteousness: they are all partakers of the benefit of
it. Christ himself the Head is rewarded for it, and every member is partaker of
the benefit and reward. But it does by no means follow, that every part should
equally partake of the benefit, but every part in proportion to its place and
capacity. The Head partakes of far more than other parts, and the more noble
members partake of more than the inferior. As it is in a natural body that
enjoys perfect health, the head, and the heart, and lungs, have a greater share
of this health. They have it more seated in them, than the hands and feet,
because they are parts of greater capacity, though the hands and feet are as
much in perfect health as those nobler parts of the body. So it is in the
mystical body of Christ: all the members are partakers of the benefit of the
Head, but it is according to the different capacity and place they have in the
body. God determines that place and capacity as he pleases. He makes whom he
pleases the foot, and whom he pleases the hand, and whom he pleases the lungs,
etc. 1 Cor 12:18, “God hath set the members every one of them in the body, as
it hath pleased him.” God efficaciously determines the place and capacity of
every member, by the different degrees of grace and assistance in the
improvement of it in this world. Those that he intends for the highest place in
the body, he gives them most of his Spirit, the greatest share of the divine
nature, the Spirit and nature of Christ Jesus the Head, and that assistance
whereby they perform the most excellent works, and do most abound in them.

Object. 4.
It may be objected against what has been supposed (viz. that rewards are
given to our good works, only in consequence of an interest in Christ, or in
testimony of God’s respect to the excellency or value of them in his sight, as
built on an interest in Christ’s righteousness already obtained). That the
Scripture speaks of an interest in Christ itself, as being given out of respect
to our moral fitness. Mat. 10:37, 38, 39, “He that loveth father or mother
more than me, is not worthy of me: he that loveth son or daughter more than me,
is not worthy of me: he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth after me, is
not worthy of me: he that findeth his life, shall lose it,” etc. Worthiness
here at least signifies a moral fitness, or an excellency that recommends. And
this place seems to intimate as though it were from respect to a moral fitness
that men are admitted even to an union with Christ, and interest in him.
Therefore this worthiness cannot be consequent on being in Christ, and by the
imputation of his worthiness, or from any value that is in us, or in our actions
in God’s sight, as beheld in Christ.

To this I answer,
that though persons when they are accepted, are not accepted as worthy,
yet when they are rejected, they are rejected as unworthy. He
that does not love Christ above other things, but treats him with such
indignity, as to set him below earthly things, shall be treated as unworthy of
Christ. His unworthiness of Christ, especially in that particular, shall be
marked against him, and imputed to him. And though he be a professing Christian,
and live in the enjoyment of the gospel, and has been visibly ingrafted into
Christ, and admitted as one of his disciples, as Judas was, yet he shall be
thrust out in wrath, as a punishment of his vile treatment of Christ. The
forementioned words do not imply that if a man does love Christ above father and
mother, etc. that he would be worthy. The most they imply is that such a
visible Christian shall be treated and thrust out as unworthy. He that believes
is not received for the worthiness or moral fitness of faith, but yet the
visible Christian is cast out by God, for the unworthiness and moral unfitness
of unbelief. A being accepted as one of Christ’s, is not the reward of
believing, but being thrust out from being one of Christ’s disciples, after a
visible admission as such, is properly a punishment of unbelief. John 3:18,19,
“He that believeth on him, is not condemned; but he that believeth not, is
condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten
Son of God. And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and
men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.”
Salvation is promised to faith as a free gift, but damnation is threatened to
unbelief as a debt, or punishment due to unbelief. They who believed while in
the wilderness, did not enter into Canaan, because of the worthiness of their
faith. But God swore in his wrath, that they that believed not should not enter
in, because of the unworthiness of their unbelief. Admitting a soul to an union
with Christ is an act of free and sovereign grace, but excluding at death, and
at the day of judgment, those professors of Christianity who have had the offers
of a Savior, and enjoyed great privileges as God’s people, is a judicial
proceeding, and a just punishment of their unworthy treatment of Christ. The
design of this saying of Christ is to make them sensible of the unworthiness of
their treatment of Christ, who professed him to be their Lord and Savior, and
set him below father and mother, etc. and not to show the worthiness of loving
him above father and mother. If a beggar should be offered any great and
precious gift, but as soon as offered, should trample it under his feet, it
might be taken from him, as unworthy to have it. Or if a malefactor should have
his pardon offered him, that he might be freed from execution, and should only
scoff at it, his pardon might be refused him, as unworthy of it. Though if he
had received it, he would not have had it for his worthiness, or as being
recommended to it by his virtue. For his being a malefactor supposes him
unworthy, and its being offered him to have it only on accepting, supposes that
the king looks for no worthiness, nothing in him for which he should bestow
pardon as a reward. This may teach us how to understand Acts 13:46, “It was
necessary that the Word of God should first have been spoken unto you; but
seeing ye put it from you, and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life,
lo, we turn to the Gentiles.”

Object.
5. It is objected against the doctrine of justification by faith alone, that
repentance is evidently spoken of in Scripture as that which is in a special
manner the condition of remission of sins: but remission of sins is by all
allowed to be that wherein justification does (at least) in great part consist.

But it must
certainly arise from a misunderstanding of what the Scripture says about
repentance, to suppose that faith and repentance are two distinct things, that
in like manner are the conditions of justification. For it is most plain from
the Scripture, that the condition of justification, or that in us by which we
are justified, is but one, and that isfaith. Faith and repentance are
not two distinct conditions of justification, nor are they two distinct things
that together make one condition of justification. But faith comprehends the
whole of that by which we are justified, or by which we come to have an interest
in Christ, and there is nothing else that has a parallel concern with it in the
affair of our salvation. And this the divines on the other side themselves are
sensible of, and therefore they suppose that the faith the apostle Paul speaks
of, which he says we are justified by alone, comprehends in it repentance.

And therefore, in
answer to the objection, I would say that when repentance is spoken of in
Scripture as the condition of pardon, thereby is not intended any particular
grace, or act, properly distinct from faith, that has a parallel influence with
it in the affair of our pardon or justification. But by repentance is intended
nothing distinct from active conversion (or conversion actively considered), as
it respects the term from which. Active conversion is a motion or exercise of
the mind that respects two terms, viz. sin and God, and by repentance is
meant this conversion, or active change of the mind, so far as it is conversant
about the term from which or about sin. This is what the word repentance
properly signifies: a change of the mind, or, which is the same thing,
the turning or the conversion of the mind. Repentance is this turning, as it
respects what is turned from. Acts 26:19. — “Whereupon, O king Agrippa, I
showed unto them of Damascus and at Jerusalem, and throughout all the coasts of
Judea, and then to the aaaaaGentiles, that they should repent, and turn to
God.” Both these are the same turning, but only with respect to opposite
terms. In the former is expressed the exercise of mind about sin in this
turning: in the other, the exercise of mind towards God.

If we look over the
Scriptures that speak of evangelical repentance, we shall presently see that
repentance is to be understood in this sense, as Mat. 9:13, “I am nota
come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.” Luke 13:3, “Except
ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.” And chap. 15:7, 10, “There is joy
in heaven over one sinner
that repenteth,” i. e. over one sinner that is converted. Acts 11:18,
“Then hath God alsoto the Gentiles granted repentance unto life.” This is
said by the Christians of the circumcision at Jerusalem, upon Peter’s giving
an account of the conversion of Cornelius and his family, and their embracing
the gospel, though Peter had said nothing expressly about their sorrow for sin.
And again, Acts 17:30, “But now commandeth all men every where
to "repent.” And
Luke 16:30, “Nay, father Abraham, but if one went to them frothe dead, they
would repent.” 2 Pet. 3:9, “The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as
some men count slackness, but is long-suffering toward us, not willing that any
should perish, but that all should come to repentance.” It is plain that in
these and other places,
by repentance is meant conversion.

Now it is true,
that conversion is the condition of pardon and justification. But if it be so,
how absurd is it to say, that conversion is one condition of justification, and
faith another, as though they were two distributively distinct and parallel
conditions? Conversion is the condition of justification, because it is
that great change by which we are brought from sin to Christ, and by which we
become believers in him: agreeable to Mat. 21:32, “And ye, when ye had seen
it, repented not afterward, that ye might believe him.” When we are directed
to repent, that our sins may be blotted out, it is as much as to say, let your
minds and hearts be changed, that your sins may be blotted out. But if it
be said, let your hearts be changed, that you may be justified, and believe,
that you may be justified, does it therefore follow, that the heart being
changed is one condition ofjustification, and believing another? But our minds
must be changed, that we may believe, and so may be justified.

And besides,
evangelical repentance, being active conversion, is not to be treated of as a
particular grace, properly and entirely distinct from faith, as by some it seems
to have been. What is conversion, but the sinful, alienated soul’s closing
with Christ, or th sinner’s being brought to believe in Christ? That exercise
of soul in conversion that respects sin, cannot be excluded out of the nature of
faith in Christ: there is something in
faith, or closing with Christ, that respects sin, and that is evangelical
repentance. That repentance which in Scripture is called, repentance for the
remission of sins, is that very principle or operation of the mind itself that
is called faith, so far as it is conversant about sin. Justifying faith in a
Mediator is conversant about two things. It is conversant about sin or evil to
be rejected and to be delivered from, and about positive good to be accepted and
obtained by the Mediator. As conversant about the former of these, it is

evangelical
repentance, or repentance for remission of sins. Surely they must be
veryignorant, or at least very inconsiderate, of the whole tenor of the gospel,
who think that the repentance by which remission of sins is obtained, can be
completed as to all that is essential to it, without any respect to Christ, or
application of the mind to the Mediator, who alone has made atonement for sin.
— Surely so great a part of salvation as remission of sins, is not to be
obtained without looking or coming to the great and only Savior. It is true,
repentance, in its more general abstracted nature, is only a sorrow for sin, and
forsaking of it, which is a duty of natural religion. But evangelical
repentance, for repentance for remission of sins, has more than this essential
to it: a dependence of
soul on the Mediator for deliverance from sin, is of the essence of it.

That justifying
repentance has the nature of faith, seems evident by Acts 19:4, “Then said
Paul, John verily baptized with the baptism of repentance, saying unto the
people, that they should believe on him which should come after him, that is, on
ChristJesus.” The latter words, “saying unto the people, that they should
believe on him,” etc.
are evidently exegetical of the former, and explain how he preached repentance
for the remission of sins. When it is said, that he preached repentance for the
remission of sin, saying that they should believe on Christ, it cannot be
supposed but that his saying, that they should believe on Christ, was intended
as directing them what to do that they might obtain the remission of sins. So 2
Tim. 2:25, “In meekness instructing those that oppose themselves; if
Godperadventure will give them repentance to the acknowledging of the
truth.” That acknowledging of the truth which there is in believing, is here
spoken of as
what is retained in repentance. And on the other hand, that faith includes
repentance in
its nature, is evident by the apostle’s speaking of sin as destroyed in faith,
Gal. 2:18. —
In the preceding verses the apostle mentions an objection against the doctrine
of
justification by faith alone, viz. that it tends to encourage men in sin,
and so to make
Christ the minister of sin. This objection he rejects and refutes with this,
“If I build again
the things that I destroyed, I make myself a transgressor.” If sin be
destroyed by faith, it
must be by repentance of sin included in it. For we know that it is our
repentance of sin,
or the ìåôáíïéá,
or turning of the mind from sin, that is our destroying our sin.

That in justifying
faith which directly respects sin, or the evil to be delivered from
by the Mediator, is as follows: a sense of our own sinfulness, and the
hatefulness of it,
and a hearty acknowledgment of its desert of the threatened punishment, looking
to the
free mercy of God in a Redeemer, for deliverance from it and its punishment.

Concerning this,
here described, three things may be noted: 1. That it is the very
same with that evangelical repentance to which remission of sins is promised in
Scripture. 2. That it is of the essence of justifying faith, and is the same
with that faith,
so far as it is conversant about evil to be delivered from by the Mediator. 3.
That this is
indeed the proper and peculiar condition of remission of sins.

1. All of it is
essential to evangelical repentance, and is indeed the very thing meant
by that repentance, to which remission of sins is promised in the gospel. As to
the former
part of the description, viz. a sense of our own sinfulness, and the
hatefulness of it, and a
hearty acknowledgment of its desert of wrath, none will deny it to be included
in
repentance. But this does not comprehend the whole essence of evangelical
repentance.
But what follows does also properly and essentially belong to its nature,
looking to the
free mercy of God in a Redeemer, for deliverance from it, and the punishment of
it. That
repentance to which remission is promised, not only always has this with it, but
it is
contained in it, as what is of the proper nature and essence of it: and respect
is ever had
to this in the nature of repentance, whenever remission is promised to it. And
it is
especially from respect to this in the nature of repentance, that it has that
promise made
to it. If this latter part be missing, it fails of the nature of that
evangelical repentance to
which remission of sins is promised. If repentance remains in sorrow for sin,
and does
not reach to a looking to the free mercy of God in Christ for pardon, it is not
that which
is the condition of pardon, neither shall pardon be obtained by it. Evangelical
repentance
is an humiliation for sin before God. But the sinner never comes and humbles
himself
before God in any other repentance, but that which includes hoping in his mercy
for
remission. If sorrow be not accompanied with that, there will be no coming to
God in it,
but a flying further from him. There is some worship of God in justifying
repentance, but
that is not in any other repentance which has not a sense of and faith in the
divine mercy
to forgive sin, Psa. 130:4, “There is forgiveness with thee, that thou mayest
be feared.”
The promise of mercy to a true penitent, in Pro. 28:13 is expressed in these
terms,
“Whoso confesseth and forsaketh his sins, shall have mercy.” But there is
faith in God’s
mercy in that confessing. The psalmist (Psalm 32) speaking of the blessedness of
the
man whose transgression is forgiven — and whose sin is covered, to whom the
Lord
imputes not sin — says that while he kept silence his bones waxed old, but he
acknowledged his sin unto God: his iniquity he did not hide. He said he would
confess
his transgression to the Lord, and then God forgave the iniquity of his sin. The
manner of
expression plainly holds forth, that then he began to encourage himself
in the mercy of
God, but his bones waxed old while he kept silence. And therefore the apostle
Paul, in
the 4th of Romans, brings this instance, to confirm the doctrine of
justification by faith
alone, that he had been insisting on. When sin is aright confessed to God, there
is always
faith in that act. That confessing of sin which is joined with despair, as in
Judas, is not
the confession to which the promise is made. In Acts 2:38, the direction given
to those
who were pricked in their heart with a sense of the guilt of sin, was to repent
and be
baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of their sins. Being
baptized in the
name of Christ for the remission of sins, implied faith in Christ for the
remission of sins.
Repentance for the remission of sins was typified of old by the priest’s
confessing the
sins of the people over the scapegoat, laying his hands on him, Lev. 16:21,
denoting it is
that repentance and confession of sin only that obtains remission, which is made
over
Christ the great sacrifice, and with dependence on him. Many other things might
be
produced from the Scripture, that in like manner confirm this point, but these
may be
sufficient.

2. All the
forementioned description is of the essence of justifying faith, and not
different from it, so far as it is conversant about sin, or the evil to be
delivered from by
the Mediator. For it is doubtless of the essence of justifying faith, to embrace
Christ as a
Savior from sin and its punishment, and all that is contained in that act is
contained in
the nature of faith itself. But in the act of embracing Christ as a Savior from
our sin and
its punishment, is implied a sense of our sinfulness, and a hatred for our sins,
or a
rejecting them with abhorrence, and a sense of our desert of punishment.
Embracing
Christ as a Savior from sin, implies the contrary act, viz. rejecting
sin. If we fly to the
light to be delivered from darkness, the same act is contrary to darkness, viz.
a rejecting
of it. In proportion to the earnestness with which we embrace Christ as a Savior
from sin,
in the same proportion is the abhorrence with which we reject sin, in the same
act. Yea,
suppose there be in the nature of faith, as conversant about sin, no more than
the hearty
embracing of Christ as a Savior from the punishment of sin, this act will imply
in it the
whole of the above-mentioned description. It implies a sense of our own
sinfulness.
Certainly in the hearty embracing of a Savior from the punishment of our
sinfulness,
there is the exercise of a sense that we are sinful. We cannot heartily embrace
Christ as a
Savior from the punishment of that which we are not sensible we are guilty of.
There is
also in the same act, a sense of our desert of the threatened punishment. We
cannot
heartily embrace Christ as a Savior from that which we are not sensible that we
have
deserved. For if we are not sensible that we have deserved the punishment, we
shall not
be sensible that we have any need of a Savior from it, or, at least, shall not
be convinced
but that God who offers the Savior, unjustly makes him needful, and we cannot
heartily
embrace such an offer. And further, there is implied in a hearty embracing
Christ as a
Savior from punishment, not only a conviction of conscience, that we have
deserved the
punishment, such as the devils and damned have, but there is a hearty
acknowledgment
of it, with the submission of the soul, so as with the accord of the heart, to
own that God
might be just in the punishment. If the heart rises against the act or judgment
of God, in
holding us obliged to the punishment, when he offers us his Son as a Savior from
the
punishment, we cannot with the consent of the heart receive him in that
character. But if
persons thus submit to the righteousness of so dreadful a punishment of sin,
this carries
in it a hatred of sin.

That such a sense
of our sinfulness, and utter unworthiness, and desert of
punishment, belongs to the nature of saving faith, is what the Scripture from
time to time
holds forth, as particularly in Mat. 15:26-28. “But he answered and said, It
is not meet to
take the children’s bread, and to cast it to dogs. And she said, Truth, Lord:
yet the dogs
eat of the crumbs which fall from their master’s table. Then Jesus answered,
and said
unto her, O woman, great is thy faith.” — And Luke 7:6-9. “The centurion
sent friends
to him, saying unto him, Lord, trouble not thyself, for I am not worthy that
thou shouldst
enter under my roof. Wherefore neither thought I myself worthy to come unto
thee; but
say in a word, and my servant shall be healed: for I also am a man set under
authority,”
etc. — “When Jesus heard these things, he marvelled at him, and turned him
about, and
said unto the people that followed him, I say unto you, I have not found so
great faith,
no, not in Israel.” And also verse 37, 38. “And behold, a woman in the city,
which was a
sinner, when she knew that Jesus sat at meat in the Pharisee’s house, brought
an
alabaster-box of ointment, and stood at his feet behind him weeping, and began
to wash
his feet with tears, and did wipe them with the hairs of her head, and kissed
his feet, and
anointed them with the ointment.” Together with verse 50. “He said unto the
woman,
Thy faith hath saved thee; go in peace.”

These things do not
necessarily suppose that repentance and faith are words of just
the same signification. For it is only so much in justifying faith as respects
the evil to be
delivered from by the Savior, that is called repentance. Besides, both
repentance and
faith take them only in their general nature, [and] are entirely distinct.
Repentance is a
sorrow for sin, and forsaking of it, and faith is a trusting in God’s
sufficiency and truth.
But faith and repentance, as evangelical duties, or justifying faith, and
repentance for
remission of sins, contain more in them, and imply a respect to a mediator, and
involve
each other’s nature: *2* though they still bear the name of
faith and repentance, from
those general moral virtues — that repentance, which is a duty of natural
religion, and
that faith, which was a duty required under the first covenant — that are
contained in this
evangelical act, which severally appear, when this act is considered with
respect to its
different terms and objects.

It may be objected
here that the Scripture sometimes mentions faith and repentance
together, as if they were entirely distinct things, as in Mark 1:15, “Repent
ye, and believe
the gospel.” But there is not need of understanding these as two distinct
conditions of
salvation, but the words are exegetical one of another. It is to teach us after
what manner
we must repent, viz. as believing the gospel, and after what manner we
must believe the
gospel, viz. as repenting. These words no more prove faith and repentance
to be entirely
distinct, than those fore-mentioned, Mat. 21:32. “And ye, when ye had seen it,
repented
not afterwards, that ye might believe him.” Or those, 2 Tim. 2:25. “If
peradventure God
will give them repentance to the acknowledging of the truth.” The apostle, in
Acts 19:4
seems to have reference to these words of John the Baptist, “John baptized
with the
baptism of repentance, saying unto the people, that they should believe,” etc.
where the
latter words, as we have already observed, are to explain how he preached
repentance.

Another Scripture
where faith and repentance are mentioned together, is Acts 20:21.
“Testifying both to the Jews, and also to the Greeks, repentance towards God,
and faith
towards the Lord Jesus Christ.” It may be objected, that in this place, faith
and
repentance are not only spoken of as distinct things, but having distinct
objects.

To this I answer,
that faith and repentance, in their general nature, are distinct
things, and repentance for the remission of sins, or that in justifying faith
that respects
the evil to be delivered from, so far as it regards that term, which is what
especially
denominates it repentance, has respect to God as the object, because he is the
Being
offended by sin, and to be reconciled, but that in this justifying act, whence
it is
denominated faith, does more especially respect Christ. But let us interpret it
how we
will, the objection of faith being here so distinguished from repentance, is as
much of an
objection against the scheme of those that oppose justification by faith alone,
as against
this scheme. For they hold that the justifying faith the apostle Paul speaks of,
includes
repentance, as has been already observed.

3. This repentance
that has been described, is indeed the special condition of
remission of sins. This seems very evident by the Scripture, as particularly,
Mark 1:4.
“John did baptize in the wilderness, and preach the baptism of repentance, for
the
remission of sins.” So, Luke 3:3, “And be came into all the country about
Jordan,
preaching the baptism of repentance, for the remission of sins.” Luke 24:47,
“And that
repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all
nations.”
Acts 5:31, “Him hath God exalted with his right hand to be a Prince and a
Saviour, for to
give repentance unto Israel, and forgiveness of sins.” Acts 2:38. Repent, and
be baptized
every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of sins.” And,
chap. 3:19.
“Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out.”
The like is
evident by Lev. 26:40-42; Job. 33:27, 28; Psa. 32:5; Pro. 28:13; Jer. 3:13. And
1 John
1:9 and other places.

And the reason may
be plain from what has been said. We need not wonder that
what in faith especially respects sin, should be especially the condition of
remission of
sins, or that this motion or exercise of the soul, as it rejects and flies from
evil and
embraces Christ as a Savior from it, should especially be the condition of being
free
from that evil: in like manner, as the same principle or motion, as it seeks
good, and
cleaves to Christ as the procurer of that good, should be the condition of
obtaining that
good. Faith with respect to good is accepting and with respect to evil it is
rejecting. Yea
this rejecting evil is itself an act of acceptance. It is accepting freedom or
separation
from that evil, and this freedom or separation is the benefit bestowed in
remission. No
wonder that what in faith immediately respects this benefit, and is our
acceptance of it,
should be the special condition of our having it. It is so with respect to all
the benefits
that Christ has purchased. Trusting in God through Christ for such a particular
benefit
that we need, is the special condition of obtaining that benefit. When we need
protection
from enemies, the exercise of faith with respect to such a benefit, or trusting
in Christ for
protection from enemies, is especially the way to obtain that particular
benefit, rather
than trusting in Christ for something else, and so of any other benefit that
might be
mentioned. So prayer (which is the expression of faith) for a particular mercy
needed, is
especially the way to obtain that mercy. *3*— So that no argument can be drawn from
hence against the doctrine of justification by faith alone. And there is that in
the nature
of repentance, which peculiarly tends to establish the contrary of justification
by works.
For nothing so much renounces our own worthiness and excellency, as repentance.
The
very nature of it is to acknowledge our own utter sinfulness and unworthiness,
and to
renounce our own goodness and all confidence in self; and so to trust in the
propitiation
of the Mediator, and ascribe all the glory of forgiveness to him.

Object. 6.
The last objection I shall mention, is that paragraph in the 3d chapter of
James, where persons are said expressly to be justified by works: Jam. 2:21.
“Was not Abraham our father justified by works?” Verse 24. “Ye see then
how that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only.” Verse 25. “Was
not Rahab the harlot justified by works?”

In answer to this
objection, I would,

1. Take notice of
the great unfairness of the divines that oppose us, in the improvement they make
of this passage against us. All will allow, that in that proposition of St.
James, “By works a man is justified, and not by faith only,” one of the
terms, either the word faith, or else the word justify, is not to
be understood precisely in the same sense as the same terms when used by St.
Paul, because they suppose, as well as we, that it was not the intent of the
apostle James to contradict St. Paul in that doctrine of justification by faith
alone, in which he had instructed the churches. But if we understand both the
terms, as used by each apostle, in precisely the same sense, then what one
asserts is a precise, direct, and full contradiction of the other: the one
affirming and the other denying the very same thing. So that all the controversy
from this text comes to this, viz. which of these two terms shall be
understood in a diversity from St. Paul. They say that it is the word faith,
for they suppose that when the apostle Paul uses the word, and makes faith that
by which alone we are justified, that then by it is understood a compliance with
and practice of Christianity in general, so as to include all saving Christian
virtue and obedience. But as the apostle James uses the word faith in this
place, they suppose thereby is to be understood only an assent of the
understanding to the truth of gospel doctrines, as distinguished from good
works, and that may exist separate from them, and from all saving grace. We, on
the other hand, suppose that the word justify is to be understood in a
different sense from the apostle Paul. So that they are forced to go as far in
their scheme, in altering the sense of terms from Paul’s use of them, as we.
But yet at the same time that they freely vary the sense of the former of them, viz.
faith, yet when we understand the latter, viz. justify, in a
different sense from St. Paul, they exclaim against us. What necessity of
framing this distinction, but only to serve an opinion? At this rate a man may
maintain anything, though never so contrary to Scripture, and elude the clearest
text in the Bible! Though they do not show us why we have not as good warrant to
understand the word justify in a diversity from St. Paul, as they the
word faith. If the sense of one of the words must be varied on either
scheme, to make the apostle James’s doctrine consistent with the apostle
Paul’s, and if varying the sense of one term or the other be all that stands
in the way of their agreeing with either scheme, and if varying the sense of the
latter be in itself as fair as of the former, then the text lies as fair for one
scheme as the other, and can no more fairly be an objection against our scheme
than theirs. And if so, what becomes of all this great objection from this
passage in James?

2. If there be no
more difficulty in varying the sense of one of these terms than another, from
anything in the text itself, so as to make the words suit with either scheme,
then certainly that is to be chosen that is most agreeable to the current of
Scripture, and other places where the same matter is more particularly and fully
treated of, and therefore that we should understand the word justify in
this passage of James, in a sense in some respects diverse from that in which
St. Paul uses it. For by what has been already said, it may appear, that there
is no one doctrine in the whole Bible more fully asserted, explained, and urged,
than the doctrine of justification by faith alone, without any of our own
righteousness.

3. There is a very
fair interpretation of this passage of St. James, no way inconsistent with this
doctrine of justification, which I have shown that other scriptures abundantly
teach, which the words themselves will as well allow of, as that which the
objectors put upon them, and much better agrees with the context: and that is,
that works are here spoken of as justifying as evidences. A man may be said to
be justified by that which clears him, or vindicates him, or makes the goodness
of his cause manifest. When a person has a cause tried in a civil court, and is
justified or cleared, he may be said in different senses to be justified or
cleared, by the goodness of his cause, and by the goodness of the evidences of
it. He may be said to be cleared by what evidences his cause to be good, but not
in the same sense as he is by that which makes his cause to be good. That which
renders his cause good, is the proper ground of his justification. It is by that
that he is himself a proper subject of it, but evidences justify, only as they
manifest that his cause is good in fact, whether they are of such a nature as to
have any influence to render it so or no. It is by works that our cause appears
to be good, but by faith our cause not only appears to be good, but becomes
good, because thereby we are united to Christ. That the word justify
should be sometimes understood to signify the former of these, as well as the
latter, is agreeable to the use of the word in common speech: as we say such an
one stood up to justify another, i.e. he endeavored to show or manifest
his cause to be good. — And it is certain that the word is sometimes used in
this sense in Scripture, when speaking of our being justified before God: as
where it is said, we shall be justified by our words, Mat. 12:37. “For by thy
words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned.” It
cannot be meant that men are accepted before God on the account of their words.
For God has told us nothing more plainly, than that it is the heart that he
looks at, and that when he acts as judge towards men, in order to justifying or
condemning, he tries the heart, Jer. 11:20. “But, O Lord of hosts, that
judgest righteously, that triest the reins and the heart, let me see thy
vengeance on them; for unto thee have I revealed my cause.” Psa. 7:8, 9,
“The Lord shall judge the people: judge me, O Lord, according to my
righteousness, and according to mine integrity that is in me. O let the
wickedness of the wicked come to an end; but establish the just; for the
righteous God trieth the hearts and reins.” Verse 11, “God judgeth the
righteous.” And many other places to the like purpose. And therefore men can
be justified by their words, no otherwise than as evidences or manifestations of
what is in the heart. And it is thus that Christ speaks of the words in this
very place, as is evident by the context, Mat. 12:34, 35. “Out of the
abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. A good man out of the good treasure
of the heart,” etc. The words, or sounds themselves, are neither parts of
godliness nor evidences of godliness, but as signs of what is inward.

God himself, when
he acts towards men as judge, in order to a declarative judgment, makes use of
evidences, and so judges men by their works. And therefore, at the day of
judgment, God will judge men according to their works. For though God will stand
in no need of evidence to inform him what is right, yet it is to be considered
that he will then sit in judgment, not as earthly judges do, to find out what is
right in a cause, but to declare and manifest what is right. And therefore that
day is called by the apostle, “the day of the revelation of the righteous
judgment of God,” Rom. 2:5.

To be justified, is
to be approved of and accepted, but a man may be said to be approved and
accepted in two respects: the one is to be approved really, and the other to be
approved and accepted declaratively. Justification is twofold: it is either the
acceptance and approbation of the judge itself, or the manifestation of that
approbation by a sentence or judgment declared by the judge, either to our own
consciences or to the world. If justification be understood in the former sense,
for the approbation itself, that is only that by which we become fit to be
approved. But if it be understood in the latter sense, for the manifestation of
this approbation, it is by whatever is a proper evidence of that fitness. In the
former, only faith is concerned, because it is by that only in us that we become
fit to be accepted and approved. In the latter, whatever is an evidence of our
fitness, is alike concerned. And therefore, take justification in this sense,
and then faith, and all other graces and good works, have a common and equal
concern in it. For any other grace, or holy act, is equally an evidence of a
qualification for acceptance or approbation, as faith.

To justify has
always, in common speech, signified indifferently, either simply approbation, or
testifying that approbation: sometimes one, and sometimes the other; because
they are both the same, only as one is outwardly what the other is inwardly. So
we, and it may be all nations, are wont to give the same name to two things,
when one is only declarative of the other. Thus sometimes judging, intends only
judging in our thoughts; at other times, testifying and declaring judgment. So
such words as justify, condemn, accept, reject, prize, slight, approve,
renounce, are sometimes put for mental acts, at other times, for an outward
treatment. So in the sense in which the apostle James seems to use the word justify
for manifestative justification, a man is justified not only by faith,
but also by works: as a tree is manifested to be good, not only by
immediately examining the tree, but also by the fruit, Pro. 20:11, “Even a
child is known by his doing, whether his work be pure, and whether it be
right.”

The drift of the
apostle does not require that he should be understood in any other sense; for
all that he aims at, as appears by a view of the context, is to prove that good
works are necessary. The error of those that he opposed was this: that good
works were not necessary to salvation, that if they did but believe that there
was but one God, and that Christ was the Son of God and the like, and were
baptized, they were safe, let them live how they would, which doctrine greatly
tended to licentiousness. The evincing the contrary of this is evidently the
apostle’s scope.

And that we should
understand the apostle, of works justifying as an evidence, and in a
declarative judgment, is what a due consideration of the context will naturally
lead us to. — For it is plain, that the apostle is here insisting on works, in
the quality of a necessary manifestation and evidence of faith, or as what the
truth of faith is made to appear by: as Jam. 2:18, “Show me thy faith without
thy works, and I will show thee my faith by my works.” And when he says, verse
26, “As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead
also.” It is much more rational and natural to understand him as speaking of
works, as the proper signs and evidences of the reality, life, and goodness of
faith. Not that the very works or actions done are properly the life of faith,
as the spirit in the body, but it is the active, working nature of faith, of
which the actions or works done are the signs, that is itself the life and
spirit of faith. The sign of a thing is often in scripture language said to be
that thing; as it is in that comparison by which the apostle illustrates it. Not
the actions themselves of a body, are properly the life or spirit of the body,
but the active nature, of which those actions or motions are the signs, is the
life of the body. That which makes men pronounce anything to be alive is that
they observe it has an active operative nature, which they observe no otherwise
than by the actions or motions which are the signs of it. It is plainly the
apostle’s aim to prove, that if faith has not works, it is a sign that it is
not a good sort of faith, which would not have been to his purpose if it was his
design to show that it is not by faith alone, though of a right sort, that we
have acceptance with God, but that we are accepted on the account of obedience
as well as faith. It is evident, by the apostle’s reasoning, that the
necessity of works, is not from their having a parallel concern in our salvation
with faith. But he speaks of works only as related to faith, and expressive of
it, which, after all, leaves faith the alone fundamental condition, without
anything else having a parallel concern with it in this affair; and other things
conditions, only as several expressions and evidences of it.

That the apostle
speaks of works justifying only as a sign, or evidence, and in God’s
declarative judgment, is further confirmed by Jam. 2:21, “Was not Abraham our
father justified by works, when he had offered up Isaac his son upon the
altar?” Here the apostle seems plainly to refer to that declarative judgment
of God concerning Abraham’s sincerity, manifested to him, for the peace and
assurance of his own conscience, after his offering up Isaac his son on the
altar, Gen. 22:12, “Now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not
withheld thy son, thine only son, from me.” But here it is plain, and
expressed in the very words of justification or approbation, that this work of
Abraham offering up his son on the altar, justified him as an evidence.
When the apostle James says, we are justified by works, he may and ought to be
understood in a sense agreeable to the instance he brings for the proof of it:
but justification in that instance appears by the works of justification
themselves, to be by works as an evidence. And where this instance of
Abraham’s obedience is elsewhere mentioned, in the New Testament, it is
mentioned as a fruit and evidence of his faith. Heb. 11:17, “By faith Abraham,
when he was tried, offered up Isaac; and he that had received the promises,
offered up his only-begotten son.”

And in the other
instance which the apostle mentions, Jam. 2:25. “Likewise also was not Rahab
the harlot justified by works, when she had received the messengers, and had
sent them out another way?” The apostle refers to a declarative judgment, in
that particular testimony which was given of God’s approbation of her as a
believer, in directing Joshua to save her when the rest of Jericho was
destroyed, Jos. 6:25, “And Joshua saved Rahab the harlot alive, and her
father’s household, and all that she had; and she dwelleth in Israel even unto
this day: because she hid the messengers which Joshua sent to spy out
Jericho.” This was accepted as an evidence and expression of her faith. Heb.
11:31, “By faith the harlot Rahab perished not with them that believed not,
when she had received the spies with peace.” The apostle in saying, “Was not
Rahab the harlot justified by works?” by the manner of his speaking has
reference to something in her history. But we have no account in her history of
any other justification of her but this.

4. If,
notwithstanding, any choose to take justification in St. James’s precisely as
we do in Paul’s epistles, for God’s acceptance or approbation itself, and
not any expression of that approbation, what has been already said concerning
the manner in which acts of evangelical obedience are concerned in the affair of
our justification, affords a very easy, clear, and full answer. For if we take
works as acts or expressions of faith, they are not excluded. So a man is not
justified by faith only, but also by works; i.e. he is not justified only
by faith as a principle in the heart, or in its first and more immanent acts,
but also by the effective acts of it in life, which are the expressions of the
life of faith, as the operations and actions of the body are of the life of
that; agreeable to Jam. 2:26.

What has been said
in answer to these objections, may also, I hope, abundantly serve for an answer
to another objection, often made against this doctrine, viz. that it
encourages licentiousness in life. For, from what has been said, we may see that
the Scripture doctrine of justification by faith alone, without any manner of
goodness or excellency of ours, does in no wise diminish either the necessity or
benefit of a sincere evangelical universal obedience. Man’s salvation
is not only indissolubly connected with obedience, and damnation with the want
of it, in those who have opportunity for it, but depends upon it in many
respects. It is the way to salvation, and the necessary preparation for it.
Eternal blessings are bestowed in reward for it, and our justification in our
own consciences and at the day of judgment depends on it, as the proper evidence
of our acceptable state; and that even in accepting of us as entitled to life in
our justification, God has respect to this, as that on which the fitness of such
an act of justification depends: so that our salvation does as truly
depend upon it, as if we were justified for the moral excellency of it. And
besides all this, the degree of our happiness to all eternity is suspended on,
and determined by, the degree of this. So that this gospel-scheme of
justification is as far from encouraging licentiousness, and contains as much to
encourage and excite to strict and universal obedience, and the utmost possible
eminency of holiness, as any scheme that can be devised, and indeed unspeakably
more.

I come now to the

V. And last thing
proposed, which is, to consider the “importance of this doctrine.”

I know there are
many that make as though this controversy was of no great importance: that it is
chiefly a matter of nice speculation, depending on certain subtle distinctions,
which many that make use of them do not understand themselves: that the
difference is not of such consequence as to be worth being zealous about: and
that more hurt is done by raising disputes about it than good.

Indeed I am far
from thinking that it is of absolute necessity that persons should understand,
and be agreed upon, all the distinctions needful particularly to explain and
defend this doctrine against all cavils and objections. Yet all Christians
should strive after an increase of knowledge, and none should content themselves
without some clear and distinct understanding in this point. But we should
believe in the general, according to the clear and abundant revelations of
God’s word, that it is none of our own excellency, virtue, or righteousness,
that is the ground of our being received from a state of condemnation
into a state of acceptance in God’s sight, but only Jesus Christ, and his
righteousness and worthiness, received by faith. This I think to be of great
importance, at least in application to ourselves, and that for the following
reasons.

First,
the Scripture treats of this doctrine, as a doctrine of very great importance.
That there is a certain doctrine of justification by faith, in opposition to
justification by the works of the law, which the Apostle Paul insists upon as of
the greatest importance, none will deny, because there is nothing in the Bible
more apparent. The apostle, under the infallible conduct of the Spirit of God,
thought it worth his most strenuous and zealous disputing about and defending.
He speaks of the contrary doctrine as fatal and ruinous to the souls of men, in
the latter end of the ninth chapter of Romans, and beginning of the tenth. He
speaks of it as subversive of the gospel of Christ, and calls it another gospel,
and says concerning it: if anyone, “though an angel from heaven, preach it,
let him be accursed;” Gal. 1:6-9 compared with the following part of the
epistle. Certainly we must allow the apostles to be good judges of the
importance and tendency of doctrines, at least the Holy Ghost in them. And
doubtless we are safe, and in no danger of harshness and censoriousness, if we
only follow him, and keep close to his express teachings, in what we believe and
say of the hurtful and pernicious tendency of any error. Why are we to blame for
saying what the Bible has taught us to say, or for believing what the Holy Ghost
has taught us to that end that we might believe it?

Second,
the adverse scheme lays another foundation of man’s salvation than God has
laid. I do not now speak of that ineffectual redemption that they suppose to be
universal, and what all mankind are equally the subjects of. But I say, it lays
entirely another foundation of man’s actual, discriminating salvation, or that
salvation, wherein true Christians differ from wicked men. We suppose the
foundation of this to be Christ’s worthiness and righteousness. On the
contrary, that scheme supposes it to be man’s own virtue, even so, that this
is the ground of a saving interest in Christ itself. It takes away Christ out of
the place of the bottom stone, and puts in men’s own virtue in the room of
him, so that Christ himself in the affair of distinguishing, actual salvation,
is laid upon this foundation. And the foundation being so different, I leave it
to everyone to judge whether the difference between the two schemes consists
only in punctilios of small consequence. The foundations being contrary, makes
the whole scheme exceeding diverse and opposite: the one is a gospel scheme, the
other a legal one.

Third,
it is in this doctrine that the most essential difference lies between the
covenant of grace and the first covenant. The adverse scheme of justification
supposes that we are justified by our works, in the very same sense
wherein man was to have been justified by his works under the first covenant. By
that covenant our first parents were not to have had eternal life given them for
any proper merit in their obedience, because their perfect obedience was a debt
that they owed God. Nor was it to be bestowed for any proportion between the
dignity of their obedience, and the value of the reward, but only it was to be
bestowed from a regard to a moral fitness in the virtue of their obedience, to
the reward of God’s favor. A title to eternal life was to be given them, as a
testimony of God’s pleasedness with their works, or his regard to the inherent
beauty of their virtue. And so it is the very same way that those in the adverse
scheme suppose that we are received into God’s special favor now, and to those
saving benefits that are the testimonies of it. I am sensible the divines of
that side entirely disclaim the popish doctrine of merit, and are free to
speak of our utter unworthiness, and the great imperfection of all our services.
But after all, it is our virtue, imperfect as it is, that recommends men
to God, by which good men come to have a saving interest in Christ, and God’s
favor, rather than others. These things are bestowed in testimony of God’s
respect to their goodness. So that whether they will allow the term merit
or no, yet they hold, that we are accepted by our own merit, in the same sense,
though not in the same degree, as under the first covenant.

But the great and
most distinguishing difference between that covenant and the covenant of grace
is, that by the covenant of grace we are not thus justified by our own works,
but only by faith in Jesus Christ. It is on this account chiefly that the new
covenant deserves the name of a covenant of grace, as is evident by Rom. 4:16:
“Therefore it is of faith, that it might be by grace.” And chap. 3:20, 24,
“Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his
sight… Being justified freely by his grace, through the redemption that is in
Jesus Christ.” And Rom. 11:6, “And if by grace, then it is no more of works;
otherwise grace is no more grace: but if it be of works; then it is no more
grace; otherwise work is no more work.” Gal. 5:4, “Whosoever of you are
justified by the law, ye are fallen from grace.” And therefore the apostle,
when in the same epistle to the Galatians, speaking of the doctrine of
justification by works as another gospel, adds, “which is not another,” Gal.
1:6, 7. It is no gospel at all: it is law. It is no covenant of grace, but of
works. It is not an evangelical, but a legal doctrine. Certainly that doctrine
wherein consists the greatest and most essential difference between the covenant
of grace and the first covenant, must be a doctrine of great importance. That
doctrine of the gospel by which above all others it is worthy of the name
gospel, is doubtless a very important doctrine of the gospel.

Fourth,
this is the main thing for which fallen men stood in need of divine revelation,
to teach us how we who have sinned may come to be again accepted of God, or,
which is the same thing, how the sinner may be justified. Something beyond the
light of nature is necessary to salvation chiefly on this account. Mere natural
reason afforded no means by which we could come to the knowledge of this: it
depending on the sovereign pleasure of the Being that we had offended by sin.
This seems to be the great drift of that revelation which God has given, and of
all those mysteries it reveals, all those great doctrines that are peculiarly
doctrines of revelation, and above the light of nature. It seems to have been
very much on this account, that it was requisite that the doctrine of the
Trinity itself should be revealed to us. That by a discovery of the concern of
the several divine persons in the great affair of our salvation, we might the
better understand and see how all our dependence in this affair is on God, and
our sufficiency all in him, and not in ourselves: that he is all in all in this
business, agreeable to 1 Cor. 1:29-31, “That no flesh should glory in his
presence. But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom,
and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption: that according as it is
written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord.” What is the gospel, but
only the glad tidings of a new way of acceptance with God unto life, a way
wherein sinners may come to be free from the guilt of sin, and obtain a title to
eternal life? And if, when this way is revealed, it is rejected, and another of
man’s devising be put in the room of it, without doubt, it must be an error of
great importance, and the apostle might well say it was another gospel.

Fifth,
the contrary scheme of justification derogates much from the honor of God and
the Mediator. I have already shown how it diminishes the glory of the Mediator,
in ascribing that to man’s virtue and goodness, which belongs alone to his
worthiness and righteousness. By the apostle’s sense of the matter it renders
Christ needless, Gal. 5:4, “Christ is become of no effect to you, whosoever of
you are justified by the law.” If that scheme of justification be followed in
its consequences, it utterly overthrows the glory of all the great things that
have been contrived, and done, and suffered in the work of redemption. Gal.
2:21, “If righteousness come by the law, Christ is dead in vain.” It has
also been already shown how it diminishes the glory of divine grace (which is
the attribute God has especially set himself to glorify in the work of
redemption), and so that it greatly diminishes the obligation to gratitude in
the sinner that is saved. Yea, in the sense of the apostle, it makes void the
distinguishing grace of the gospel, Gal. 5:4, “Whosoever of you are justified
by the law, are fallen from grace.” It diminishes the glory of the grace of
God and the Redeemer, and proportionably magnifies man. It makes the goodness
and excellency of fallen man to be something, which I have shown are nothing. I
have also already shown, that it is contrary to the truth of God in the
threatening of his holy law, to justify the sinner for his virtue. And whether
it were contrary to God’s truth or no, it is a scheme of things very unworthy
of God. It supposes that God, when about to lift up a poor, forlorn malefactor,
condemned to eternal misery for sinning against his Majesty, and to make him
unspeakably and eternally happy, by bestowing his Son and himself upon him, as
it were, sets all this to sale, for the price of his virtue and excellency. I
know that those we oppose acknowledge, that the price is very disproportionate
to the benefit bestowed, and say, that God’s grace is wonderfully manifested
in accepting so little virtue, and bestowing so glorious a reward for such
imperfect righteousness. But seeing we are such infinitely sinful and abominable
creatures in God’s sight, and by our infinite guilt have brought ourselves
into such wretched and deplorable circumstances — and all our righteousnesses
are nothing, and ten thousand times worse than nothing (if God looks upon them
as they be in themselves — is it not immensely more worthy of the infinite
majesty and glory of God, to deliver and make happy such wretched vagabonds and
captives, without any money or price of theirs, or any manner of expectation of
any excellency or virtue in them, in any wise to recommend them? Will it not
betray a foolish, exalting opinion of ourselves, and a mean one of God, to have
thought of offering anything of ours, to recommend us to the favor of being
brought from wallowing, like filthy swine, in the mire of our sins, and from the
enmity and misery of devils in the lowest hell, to the state of God’s dear
children, in the everlasting arms of his love in heavenly glory, or to imagine
that that is the constitution of God, that we should bring our filthy rags, and
offer them to him as the price of this?

Sixth,
the opposite scheme does most directly tend to lead men to trust in their own
righteousness for justification, which is a thing fatal to the soul. This is
what men are of themselves exceedingly prone to do (and that though they are
never so much taught the contrary), through the partial and high thoughts they
have of themselves, and their exceeding dullness of apprehending any such
mystery as our being accepted for the righteousness of another. But this scheme
does directly teach men to trust in their own righteousness for justification,
in that it teaches them that this is indeed what they must be justified by,
being the way of justification that God himself has appointed. So that if a man
had naturally no disposition to trust in his own righteousness, yet if he
embraced this scheme, and acted consistent with it, it would lead him to it. But
that trusting in our own righteousness, is a thing fatal to the soul, is what
the Scripture plainly teaches us. It tells us that it will cause that Christ
shall profit us nothing, and be of no effect to us, Gal. 5:2-4. For though the
apostle speaks there particularly of circumcision, yet it is not merely being
circumcised, but trusting in circumcision as a righteousness, that the apostle
has respect to. He could not mean that merely being circumcised would render
Christ of no profit or effect to a person, for we read that he himself, for
certain reasons, took Timothy and circumcised him, Acts 16:3. And the same is
evident by the context, and by the rest of the epistle. And the apostle speaks
of trusting in their own righteousness as fatal to the Jews, Rom 9:31, 32,
“But Israel, which followed after the law of righteousness, hath not attained
to the law of righteousness. Wherefore? Because they sought it not by faith, but
as it were by the works of the law; for they stumbled at that stumbling
stone.” Together with Rom. 10:3, “For they being ignorant of God’s
righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not
submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God.” And this spoken of as
fatal to the Pharisees, in the parable of the Pharisee and the publican, which
Christ spoke to them in order to reprove them for trusting in themselves that
they were righteous. The design of the parable is to show them, that the very
publicans shall be justified, rather than they, as appears by the reflection
Christ makes upon it, Luke 18:14, “I tell you, this man went down to his house
justified rather than the other;” that is, this and not the other. The fatal
tendency of it might also be proved from its inconsistency with the nature of
justifying faith, and with the nature of that humiliation that the Scripture
often speaks of as absolutely necessary to salvation. But these Scriptures are
so express, that it is needless to bring any further arguments.

How
far a wonderful and mysterious agency of God’s Spirit may so influence some
men’s hearts, that their practice in this regard may be contrary to their own
principles, so that they shall not trust in their own righteousness, though they
profess that men are justified by their own righteousness — or how far they
may believe the doctrine of justification by men’s own righteousness in
general, and yet not believe it in a particular application of it to themselves
— or how far that error which they may have been led into by education, or
cunning sophistry of others, may yet be indeed contrary to the prevailing
disposition of their hearts, and contrary to their practice — or how far some
may seem to maintain a doctrine contrary to this gospel doctrine of
justification, that really do not, but only express themselves differently from
others, or seem to oppose it through their misunderstanding of our expressions,
or we of theirs, when indeed our real sentiments are the same in the main — or
may seem to differ more than they do, by using terms that are without a
precisely fixed and determinate meaning — or to be wide in their sentiments
from this doctrine, for want of a distinct understanding of it: whose hearts, at
the same time, entirely agree with it, and if once it was clearly explained to
their understandings, would immediately close with it, and embrace it. How far
these things may be, I will not determine, but am fully persuaded that great
allowances are to be made on these and such like accounts, in innumerable
instances. Though it is manifest from what has been said, that the teaching and
propagating contrary doctrines and schemes, is of a pernicious and fatal
tendency.